il&A;^:*^ 


W^^^. 


RETURN   TO 
W.  B.  OLMSTED, 


4-   W^-^ 


Life  and  Sermons 


Jonathan   Allen, 

Ph.D.,D.D.,LL.D.,  President  of  Alfred  University 

By   his   wife 


He  glorified  life,  exalted  duty,  and  brought 
us  face  to  face  with  God.— Caroline  H.  Dall,  LL.D. 


ILLUSTRATED, 


PUBLISHED    BY    SUBSCRIPTION. 

]  H  U  4  . 


COPYRK'.HTKD    1S94 
MRS.    ABIGAIL    A.    ALLEN, 


Pacific  F'ress  Publishing  Co.,  Oakland,  Cal. 


TO 

ALFRED    STUDENTS, 

THIS    WORK    IS    LOWINGLY    DEDICATED 
THE    AUTHOR. 


Note.— Most  grateful  thanks  are  due  the  many  teachers,  students,  and  friends,  who  have,  by  their 
written  words  and  generous  pecuniary  help,  made  it  possible  to  put  these  records  in  permanent  form . 

Many  of  these  names  will  appear  with  what  they  have  written  in  the  book,  but  others,  though  not 
mentioned,  may  be  assued  they  have  given  strength  and  courage  to  the  author  to  go  on  with  her  work. 
The  illustrations  have  been,  with  one  exception,  furnished  by  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Irving  Saunders. 


[725520 


OBcJEGT  OF  THE   BOOK. 

■^1  -^  VERY  man's  life  is  his  own  biography.  He  deUneates  himself  in 
■  A  all  his  activities  from  childhood  to  the  grave.  President  Allen's 
^^C5^  favorite  motto  was  Cromwell's  direction  to  his  artist,  "Paint 
me  as  I  am."  In  these  pages  we  wish  to  present  such  a  true  picture  ot  the 
man  that  those  who  read  them  may  feel  the  power  of  his  personal  influence. 
With  some  there  may  be  a  desire  to  know  of  the  childhood,  the  environ- 
ments and  the  struggles  that  helped  to  mould  his  character.  We  hope 
this  book  may  bring  to  such,  hours  of  pleasure  and  profit,  and  as  their 
children  shall  know  the  life  that  he  lived  and  the  sermons  that  he  preached 
to  their  fathers  and  mothers,  the  knowledge  may  help  them  onward  and 
upward.  Encouraged  by  this  hope,  and  wishing  to  perpetuate  his  memory, 
we  have  prepared  this  tribute  of  love. 

We  trust  that  all  students  and  friends  of  Alfred  University,  past,  present, 
and  future,  will  feel  that  it  is  to  them,  and  for  them,  that  this  book  has  been 
prepared.  That  through  these  pages  they  may  catch  a  glimpse  of  the  noble, 
unselfish  man  so  many  of  them  have  known  and  loved,  is  the  fervent  wish  of 
the  author,  A.  A.  Allen. 


(V) 


INTRODUGTIOM. 

O  one  understands  better  than  the  author  herself  how  far  short  of 
what  President  Allen  was  can  any  word  picture  portray  him. 
Those  who  knew  him  best  continually  found  new  surprises  in  the 
freshness  and  fullness  of  his  investigations,  in  every  phase  of  life  and  ex- 
perience. We  cannot  do  better  than  give  his  own  ideas  of  biography,  as  he 
once  wrote  them: — 

"  Biography,  the  personal  history  of  life  and  character,  is  an  interesting 
and  instructive  branch  of  literature.  It  is  the  best  possible  substitute  for  the 
personal  presence  of  those  who  have  lived  and  acted  for  us.  Their  deeds  and 
experiences  are  here  presented  for  example  or  warning.  In  it  we  see  the 
moving  forces  in  the  development  of  society,  the  origination  of  customs, 
laws,  governments.  The  moving,  controlling  spirits  in  the  world's  progress 
are  here  revealed  as  struggling  up  through  difficulties,  from  small  beginnings, 
to  high  stations  and  commanding  influences,  becoming  ever-burning  lights 
for  the  inspiration  and  guidance  of  others. 

"When  a  great,  good,  or  original  character  arises,  all  have  a  desire  to 
know  the  springs  of  his  power,  the  details  of  his  living  and  doing.  What- 
ever came  to  such  in  opportunity  and  achievement,  whatever  influence  he 
started  for  human  well  being,  becomes  of  especial  interest.  Strength  of  mind 
and  character,  patriotism,  love  of  liberty,  poetic  fire,  religious  elevation,  and 
all  true  greatness  become  highly  instructive  and  finely  inspirational.  Truths 
thus  come  to  us,  not  as  abstractions,  but  embodied,  living,  thinking,  willing, 
accomplishing,  thereby  influencing,  developing  character.  It  puts  to  the 
test  of  practice  multitudinous  and  abstract  truths,  reducing  them  to  a  con- 
crete form.  We  see  one  excelling  in  patience,  another  in  justice,  another  in 
temperance,  another  in  benevolence,  while  perhaps  now  and  then  one  seems 
to  shine  forth  with  all  of  the  graces  combined.  Such  lives  are  powerful  influ- 
ences for  enkindling  a  longing  for  like  living  in  others.  The  love  of  knowl- 
edge which  has  kept  a  youth  to  his  studies,  seeking  from  afar  the  cloud- 
capped  summits  of  science,  kindles  in  others  a  like  love,  producing  a  like 
seeking.     The  patriot  awakens  a  love  of  country;  the  philanthropist,  a  love 


VIU  INTRODUCTION. 

of  human  kind;  the  reformer,  a  love  of  progress;  the  devout  lights  up  the 
religious  sentiments. 

"  In  order  for  these  goodly  influences  to  become  effective,  biography  must 
have  for  its  subjects  characters,  not  of  the  bad  and  ignoble,  not  given  to  dry, 
outward  circumstances  and  conditions,  not  to  accidental  place  and  distinction, 
but  rather  of  those  which  "reveal  the  spiritual  springs  and  processes,  the 
power  of  great  purpose,  the  force  of  high  aims  and  earnest,  persistent 
endeavor.  Such  make  life  real,  earnest,  inspirational,  by  permitting  us  to 
walk  arm  in  arm  with  them,  to  walk  face  to  face  with  them,  breathe  the  same 
air,  feel  the  same  heat  and  light. 

"Such  being  the  influence  of  right  biography,  it  evidently  claims  attention 
in  all  plans  for  reading,  should  occupy  a  prominent  place  in  all  libraries  for 
the  young.  The  wise,  the  good,  the  great,  of  all  ages,  should  be  permitted 
to  walk  with  us,  to  cross  the  threshold  of  all  our  homes,  sit  by  our  firesides  with 
us,  enabling  us  to  gather  to  ourselves  those  powers  and  methods  by  which 
they  have  helped  on  the  world's  progress,  and  thus  enabling  us  to  fitly  meet 
the  issues  which  they  have  bequeathed  to  us,  thereby  helping  on  the  world 
to  still  higher  issues." 


CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER  I. 
Alfred  in  Early  Times— Removal  of  Ancestors  from  Rhode  Island  to  Alfred, 
N.  Y.— Six  Weeks'  Journeying  through  Forests— Judge  Clark  Crandall,  the 
Pioneer  Father  of  the   New  Settlement— The   New   Home— Birthplace  of 
Jonathan  Allen  ^7 

CHAPTER  II. 
Boyhood— Care  of  Younger  Brothers  and  Sisters— Visits  to  Grandparents— First 
Map  of  Alfred  Made  by  Father  Allen— Work  in  the  Home— Early  Habits  of 
Reading— Industry  Cultivated— Sense  of  Justice  Tried— First  Interest  in  Tem- 
perance Work— Sabbath  in  the  Home— Attendance  at  Church— Religious 
Culture  a  Safeguard  to  the  Community— Social  Life  of  Pioneers— First 
Removal ^^ 

CHAPTER  III. 
Select  School  Established— Chopping  Wood  to  Pay  Tuition— The  Pupils 
Providing  Their  Own  Seats— First  Declamation— Religious  Awakening- 
Making  Maple  Sugar— Sports  and  Games  of  Young  People— Erection  of  the 
"Horned  Bug"— J.  R.  Irish  as  Teacher— Wm.  C.  Kenyon  Following  in 
Charge  of  the  School— Public  Examination  at  Close  of  Term— Dramatic 
Entertainment ^° 

CHAPTER  IV. 

Pioneer  Life  in  Wisconsin — Decides  for  an  Education  and  Returns  to  Alfred 
—Welcomed  by  Friends— Life-work  Begun— Teachers  at  Alfred— Assistant 
in  Mathematics 35 

CHAPTER  V. 

The  Franklin  Lyceum  and  Its  Leading  Members— The  School  Breezy  with  Re- 
forms—Temperance at  Alfred— Schools  in  Little  Genesee  and  Ceres— Return 
to  Alfred— New  School  Buildings— Anniversary  Days— Loading  Sand- 
Making  Brick— General  Interest  in  the  School— Caring  for  the  Sick— New 
Societies  Organized 4° 

CHAPTER  VI. 
Oberltn— "  Underground  Railroad  "—Fugitives— Sabbath  Discussion— Woman's 
Rights  Topics— Teaching  in  Milton,  Wis.— Graduates  at  Oberlin  before  Re- 
turning to  Alfred 48 

(ix) 


X  CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER  VII. 

General  Advancement — Syndicate  Formed — Co-workers — Marriage — Prepar- 
ing Teachers  for  the  Common  Schools— Prosperity  Followed  Faithful  Work- 
General  Agent  for  Educational  Society— Birth  and  Death  of  First  Child 54 

CHAPTER  VIII. 

College  Charter  and  Grounds— Winter  in  Albany— Honors  Conferred— 
Various  Ways  of  Students'  Boarding— Burning  of  South  Hall— Work  on  the 
Campus— "The  Picture-sque"— The  Work  of  Beautifying — Music  of  the 
Trees— "  Power  of  the  Beautiful" 59 

CHAPTER  IX. 
In  War  Times— Our  Soldier  Boys— Going  to  Washington— On  the  March— Letter 
from  W.  W.  Brown— Extracts  from  an  Address— Bravery  of  Alfred  Boys— 
"Starred  Names" 69 

CHAPTER  X. 
\'acation  Outings— Camping  Out— To  the  White  Mountains— Leroy 79 

CHAPTER  XI. 
In  Memoriam — Extracts  from  Memorial  Sermon— "A  Pilgrimage  " 82 

CHAPTER  XII. 
Chosen    President— Methods   of   Teaching — Elocution — Ordination— Sermons 
and  Lectures— Chapel  Lectures 87 

CHAPTER  XIII. 

Steinheim— Collecting  Specimens  in  Vacations— Alfred  Favorable  for  the  Study 
of  Geology  and  Paleontology— South  American  Shells— Exterior  of  Building 
to  Represent  Geological  Formation  at  Alfred- Interior  Representative  of 
Native  Woods — Archaeology — Numismatics — Keramics — Land  and  Fresh 
Water  Shells— Oology— Paleontology— Miscellany 94 

CHAPTER  XIV. 

Faithfulness  of  Trustees  and  Citizens— The  Faculty— False  Ideas  of  Students' 
Needs — Success  of  Graduates — Words  from  Professor  Pickett — Sermon,  The 
College  Community 103 

CHAPTER  XV. 

Woman's  Share  in  Education— Extracts  from  Sketches  of  Caroline  H.  Dall 
and  Mrs.  Browning— Words  from  Mr.  P.  A.  Burdick  and  Professor  Rogers....  1 13 

CHAPTER  XVI. 

The  Home— Memories  of  the  Home— President  Allen's  Lectures— "The  Legacy 
of  the  Present  to  the  Future"— "Home  and  Parent" .118 


CONTENTS.  XI 

CHAPTER  XVir. 

Vacation  Tour  in  Europe— "The  Cram  Club"— Outward  Bound— The  Trip 
Northward— Pleasantries— Ireland— Giant's  Ring— The  Home  of  Shakes- 
peare—"  New  Place"— The  Church  of  the  Holy  Trinity— Concerning 
Schools— Rugby— Oxford— Cambridge— Making  Hay— Chamouni  and  Mt. 
Blanc— Merde  Glace— Up  Vesuvius— How  the  Rest  Happened 125 

CHAPTER  XVIll. 

Literary  Societies  and  Library— The  Four  Lyceums— Session  Rooms  and 
Public  Entertainments— The  Secret  of  His  Influence— Alumni  Meetings— The 
Library ^48 

CHAPTER  XIX. 

The  Western  Trip  in  1891— The  Start— A  Week  in  the  National  Park— Among 
the  Geysers— Return  across  the  Dakotas  and  Minnesota,  and  Down  the 
Lakes  • ^53 

CHAPTER  XX. 
The  Last  Year— Work  during  Winter  Evenings— Anniversary— Conclusion 158 

CHAPTER  XXI. 

Memorial  Services— Dr.  Maxson's  Prayer— Order  of  Exercises— Tributes  from 
Trustees,  Teachers,  and  Students— Extracts  from  Alfred  ^'w//— Remarks  by 
President  Whitford,  of  Milton,  Wisconsin— Short  Poems  from  E.  H.  Everett, 
E.  E.  Kenyon,  Mary  Bassett  Clarke 161 

CHAPTER  XXII. 

Views  of  President  Allen's  Character— On  Behalt  of  Public  Interests, 
from  Judge  McLennan's  Address— On  Behalf  of  Moral  Reforms,  by  Mr.  P.  A. 
Burdick— A  Completed  Life-work,  Judge  N.  M.  Hubbard 171 

CHAPTER  XXIIL 

Memories  from  Old  Students— From  Colonel  Weston  Flint— From  Dr.  Daniel 
Lewis— Reminiscences  of  Alfred,  by  Judge  Nye — Reminiscences  of  Alfred  (2), 
Charles  A.  Chapin— A  Scientific  Outing— Reminiscences  of  Alfred  (3),  Vande- 
lia  Varnum— The  Teacher— Too  Much  Interest— Came  to  Our  Help— Remi- 
niscences of  Alfred  (4),  Mary  Setchel  Haight— The  Julia  Ward  Howe  Contro- 
versy—Words from  Rev.  E.  M.  Dunn— Christie  Skinner  Krusen— Susie  M. 
Burdick— Judge  and  Mrs.  S.  O.  Thatcher— Hon.  W.  W.  Brown— Rev.  A. 
Purdy— Professor  Geo.  Scott— Rev.  L.  C.  Rogers 179 


SERMONS. 


PACK. 

God  in  All,  All  in  God ^99 

Professional  or  Life  Labor 210 

Death  of  the  President 217 

Faith 228 

Obligation  Imposed  by  Culture 243 

Thanksgiving  Sermon 254 

Rev.  Nathan  Vars  Hull 264 

President  James  Abram  Garfield 271 

Bethel  Theory  of  the  Universe 282 

TheShekinah 289 

The  Ministry  of  Beauty 297 

The  Ministry  of  Joy  and  Sorrow .^06 

The  Ideal  College— A  Light 3H 

The  People's  Debt  to  Colleges 321 

Personality 34 1 

Christology 35° 

God  the  Supreme  Father— Man  His  Child 353 

Co-workers  with  God 355 

Ideal  Youthful  Growing 3^4 

Divine  Guidance  and  Help 375 

The  True  Education 392 


(  xiii  ) 


LIST   OF    ILLUSTRATIONS. 

PAGE. 

1.  Portrait  of  President  Allen Frontispiece 

2.  Birthplace Opposite    20 

3.  Group  OF  Early  Teachers "  54 

4.  Walks  TO  Chapel  AND  Town,... "  66 

5.  Steinheim "  94 

6.  View  in  Upper  Hall,  Steinheim "         102 

7.  Group  OF  Teachers  in  1884 "         112 

8.  The  Family "         118 

9.  The  Home "         124 

10.  The  Cram  Club "         i44 

11.  A  View  OF  University  Buildings "         152 

12.  Over  THE  South  Bridge "         178 

1-5.     South  Corner  IN  THE  Study "         198 


(XV) 


CHAPTER    I 


ALFRED    IN     EARLY    TIMES. 

BIRTH  OF  JONATHAN  ALLEN. 

JONATHAN  ALLEN,  the  eldest  son  of  Abram  and 
Dorcas  Burdick  Allen,  was  born  in  the  town  of  Alfred, 
January  26,  1823.  He  was  the  true  son  of  this  moun- 
tain region,  "this  eagle's  nest,"  as  he  was  wont  to  call  this  lovely 
valley.  The  record  of  some  of  his  ancestors  could  be  traced 
back  to  the  mountains  of  Scotland,  and  to  the  uplands  of  all  the 
countries  from  whence  they  came,  even  to  the  sacred  hills  of 
Palestine.  Thus  in  this  wilderness  they  naturally  sought  a  home 
among  the  hills. 

The  New  England  States,  with  their  rocky  soil  and  fast 
increasing  population,  became,  early  in  the  country's  history,  a 
difficult  place  for  a  poor  man  to  procure  a  home  and  competence. 
Before  and  soon  after  the  Revolution  a  few  bold  spirits  sought 
and  made  homes  in  the  Western  wilds,  as  most  of  this  part  of 
New  York  was  then  known,  but  they  had  kept  close  to  the  lakes 
and  the  valleys  of  the  Susquehanna  and  Genesee,  with  their  trib- 
utaries. A  few  of  the  early  settlers,  however,  had  penetrated 
as  far  as  the  foothills  of  the  Alleghanies,  but  it  was  not  till  after 
the  year  1812  that  safety  from  Indian  raids,  and  the  construction 
of  State  and  military  roads,  made  the  country  desirable  for  the 
general  settler.  Between  the  years  181 5  and  1820  hosts  of  fam- 
ilies from  Rhode  Island  and  other  States  came  to  make  new 
homes  in  the  part  of  the  country  where  land  was  cheap,  soil  fer- 
tile, cind  there  was  an  abundance  of  fuel  for  the  long,  cold  win- 
ters. Deep  into  the  unbroken  forests,  through  roads  often  only 
underbrushed,  up  the  winding  valleys  of  the  Chemung  and  Can- 

(  n) 


1 8  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

acadea,  came  oxen  and  horses  drawing  the  old  Dutch  wagons  cov- 
ered with  coarse  cloth  that  could  be  made  into  useful  articles  for 
the  family.  On  this  one  vehicle  was  often  loaded  all  the  house- 
hold goods,  among  which  would  be  disposed  father,  mother,  and 
children. 

REMOVAL  OF  ANCESTORS  FROM  RHODE  ISLAND. 

Most  of  those  that  came  to  Alfred  were  from  Rhode  Island 
and  were  descendants  of  the  Independent  Thinkers,  who,  with 
Roger  Williams,  were  driven  out  Irom  the  Plymouth  Colony, 
They  claimed  the  right  to  worship  God  according  to  the  Bible 
and  the  dictates  of  their  own  consciences,  but  not  according  to 
the  rules  of  the  church.  Such  men  have  always  made  the  pio- 
neers in  all  advance  work  or  thought. 

In  1817  came  John  Allen,  and  his  wife.  Amy  McCumber 
Allen,  with  three  sons  and  four  daughters,  the  eldest  son  remain- 
ing in  the  East,  while  the  married  daughter  and  her  husband 
accompanied  the  parents  in  their  removal.  Katie,  then  a  wee 
girl,  often  told  us  how  the  neighbors  and  friends  came  weeping 
to  bid  them  good-by,  never  expecting  to  see  their  faces  again 
this  side  of  heaven.  This  little  girl  was  the  "Aunt  Katie"  of 
our  memory,  who,  living  nearly  eighty  years,  welcomed  often  to 
her  home  not  only  many  of  these  friends,  but  numbers  of  their 
grandchildren. 

A  yoke  of  oxen  and  a  span  of  horses  brought  all  the  house- 
hold goods  of  both  families.  Among  these  came  the  woolen 
and  flax  wheels,  with  the  cards  for  combing  and  preparing  both 
wool  and  flax,  indispensable  to  the  thrilty  housewife  of  those  days. 
She  it  was  who  must  spin,  weave,  and  make  by  hand  most  of 
the  material  used  for  clothing  the  family  and  furnishing  the  home. 

SIX  weeks'  JOURNEY. 

They  brought  with  them  little  bags  of  seeds,  especially  of 
apple  and  pear,  together  with  peach,  plum,  and  cherry  stones,  in 
order  to  make  a  nursery  as  soon  as  jjossiblc  It  took  tliem  six 
weeks  to  make  the  journey  of  five  hundred  miles — much  of  the 
way  being  through  unbroken  forest.      Often  the  road  was  almost 


ALFRED    IN    EARLY    TIMES.  1 9 

impassable  and  the  streams  were  without  bridges.  The  able- 
bodied  members  of  the  family  walked  much  of  the  distance,  and 
all  were  often  obliged  to  camp  and  sleep  under  the  trees  or  in 
the  wagons.  Wolves  and  other  wild  animals  sometimes  made 
these  nights  a  terror  by  their  shrieks  and  howls,  though  some- 
one always  remained  as  a  sentinel,  to  keep  up  a  blaze  for  safety 
to  themselves  and  their  teams,  as  wild  animals  never  approach 
a  bright  fire. 

Judge  Clark  Crandall,  who,  with  a  few  other  families,  had 
come  into  this  wilderness  as  early  as  1808,  was  the  pioneer 
father  of  the  new  setilement.  It  was  he,  with  a  few  others,  who 
gave  a  hearty  welcome  to  our  travelers  and  made  them  feel  at 
once  well  repaid  for  the  dangers  and  hardships  they  had  endured 
in  coming  to  their  new  home. 

THE  NEW  HOME. 

Grandfather  Allen  was  very  fortunate  in  the  selection  of  his 
farm,  one  hundred  and  fifty  acres  of  woodland,  sloping  to  the 
south  and  east.  The  most  distinctive  feature  of  these  sturdy 
Western  settlers  was  their  immediate  preparation  for  intellectual 
and  spiritual  culture  ;  consequently  a  building  was  erected  for 
worship  and  schools  almost  as  soon  as  their  dwelling  houses. 
These  were  of  log,  and  rude,  but  answered  the  full  purpose  for 
which  they  were  intended.  While  waiting  for  their  new  house, 
the  family  lived  in  a  log  schoolhouse,  it  being  vacation.  From 
here  every  morning  at  six  o'clock  grandfather  and  the  three 
boys,  John,  of  fourteen,  George,  of  sixteen,  and  Abram,of  eight- 
een years  went  a  mile  over  the  hill  through  the  dense  forest  to 
cut  down  the  trees  and  hew  them  into  shape  for  building. 

One  morning  when  the  noonday  lunch  was  prepared  for  the 
builders,  there  was  nothing  left  for  the  hungry  little  ones  at  home. 
Not  a  word  had  been  said,  but  after  they  had  gone,  this  brave 
Scotch  mother  saddled  her  horse  and  rode  eight  or  ten  miles  to 
where  a  few  families  with  means  had  come  into  the  country 
some  years  before  and  now  had  an  abundance  of  food.  The 
Lockharts  and    Karrs  of  Karr  Valley  were  among  these.      She 


20  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

brought  back  some  flax  to  spin,  and  the  pay  for  it  in  advance, 
which  consisted  of  a  small  bag  of  meal,  some  beans,  and  a  little 
meat,  that  she  might  have  supper  ready  for  the  father  and  boys 
when  they  returned.  These  horseback  rides  became  so  frequent 
that  every  family  in  the  settlement  not  only  knew  this  intrepid 
woman  and  her  horse,  but  were  glad  to  call  her  in  to  rest  and 
share  their  comforts.  This  undaunted  spirit  she  bequeathed  to 
her  grandson,  as  his  especial  inheritance. 

James,  the  eldest  son,  married  a  Connecticut  girl,  and  settled 
two  miles  to  the  west.  Abram,  the  second  son,  married,  in  1821, 
Dorcas  Burdick,  the  daughter  of  a  near  neighbor.  He  secured 
one  hundred  acres  of  land,  upon  which  was  already  a  small  log 
house.  In  this  the  family  altar  was  erected,  and  here,  in  1823, 
Jonathan  Allen,  the  eldest  of  six  children,  was  born. 


J» 

i'v* 

-■  -  *::  . 

■i?s^  i^^^-' 

^ 

M^^-i  ■'"^^P^*-:*  -'*■'«->•***"- 

--m 

^          "^^^^^P*   ■ 

GhAPTER    II. 


BOYHOOD. 


IN  this  new  household  busy  years  followed  for  the  young 
mother.  The  three  brothers  and  two  sisters  that  came  dur- 
ing the  next  five  years  became  Jonathan's  especial  care  in 
all  his  early  boyhood.  He  was  always  old  and  thoughtful  for 
his  years.  His  brother,  Deacon  Allen,  writes:  "He  was  ever 
our  peacemaker,  and  the  champion  and  protector  of  the  little 
twin  sisters,  always  called  'the  babies.'"  As  soon  as  they  were 
old  enough  to  walk,  all  the  bright,  sunny  days  were  spent  in  the 
fields  and  woods  around  the  home.  The  little  girls  placed  in  the 
center,  and  the  twin  brothers  one  on  each  side,  with  the  older 
brothers  each  taking  a  hand  of  these,  made  quite  a  string  of 
babies,  the  eldest  being  less  than  seven  years  old.  They  would 
walk,  run,  and  sing,  hunting  baby  treasures.  These  children  of 
the  forest  knew  every  sunny  knoll  where  the  first  buds  of  spring 
would  open,  and  their  tiny  hands  gathered  each  day  their  little 
aprons  full  of  the  lovely  hepatica,  the  long,  glossy  partridge 
vines,  with  their  scarlet  fruit,  the  brown,  velvety  moss,  and  spicy 
wintergreen.  Some  of  these  must  always  be  kept  for  mother, 
whose  tender  smile  would  well  repay  the  loving  little  hearts.  So 
the  bare  feet  pressed  each  sod  on  that  bright  hillside,  where 
some  new  flower,  leaf,  or  bird's  nest  brought  zest  to  the  new  day. 
When  weary,  they  would  choose  some  sunny,  mossy  hillock  or 
shady  nook,  and  lie  down,  a  group  of  tired  children,  all  falling 
asleep  save  the  ever-watchful  Jonathan. 

Perhaps,  more  than  he  himself  knew,  we  owe  his  lifelong 
heroic  defense  of  woman  to  the  tender  care  of  these  little  sisters. 
Rich  or  poor,  black  or  white,  he  believed  with  all  his  soul  that 
woman,  as  a  child  of  God,  had  a  right  to  live  her  ow^n  independ- 

(21) 


22  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

ent  life,  and  work  out  her  own  soul's  destiny.  In  him  she  always 
found  a  ready  and  fearless  advocate.  H  is  counsel  to  every  young 
woman  was,  "Go  forward;  trust  in  your  own  good  sense  and  in 
God  for  success." 

He  showed  very  early  an  uncommonly  sensitive  nature,  as  his 
observations  of  all  around  him  were  keen,  poetic,  and  lasting. 
Once,  when  a  small  child,  he  was  allowed  to  see  a  little  cousin 
buried.  The  horror  of  that  baby  being  put  into  the  ground 
never  left  him,  and  through  his  whole  life  it  was  a  dark  shadow, 
making  him  ever  search  eagerly  for  some  better  way.  Indeed, 
this  was  the  first  foreshadowing  of  the  idea  which  in  later  years 
developed  into  his  earnest  support  of  cremation. 

VISITS  TO  GRANDPARENTS. 

He  was  very  fond  of  going  to  the  homes  of  his  grandparents. 
Grandma  Allen  and  Aunt  Katie  would  always  have  some  choice 
apple  or  bit  of  sugar  for  their  pet,  and  these  expressions  of  love, 
so  rare  to  him,  were  among  his  brightest  memories.  When 
staying  the  night,  they  would  allow  him  to  sit  up  later  than  his 
wont,  in  order  to  stand  by  the  little  work  table  and  snuff  the 
tallow  dip.  How  he  would  watch  the  waning  light,  that  his 
power  could  make  shine  again !  They  used  to  call  him  the  "little 
candle  miller."  The  same  snuffers,  iron  candlestick,  and  three- 
legged  table  are  now  among  the  choice  treasures  of  the  Stein- 
heim.  How  well  he  remembered  the  first  time  he  was  called  a 
good  boy,  for  to  those  stern  characters  praise  was  considered 
almost  a  sin,  degenerating  into  flattery. 

At  Grandfather  Burdick's  there  were  two  sick  aunts,  where 
his  willing  hands  and  feet  always  proved  hasty  messengers  to 
minister  to  their  many  calls.  Being  at  one  time  uncommonly 
patient  and  helpful,  one  of  them  said,  "You  are  a  good  boy, 
Jonathan."  The  sensation  was  so  new  that  he  almost  cried  for 
joy.  At  another  time  one  of  them  said,  "You  would  make  a 
good  doctor."  "I  am  too  lazy  for  a  doctor,"  came  the  ready 
answer ;  but,  thinking  it  over,  his  childish  fancy  built  up  many 
an  air-castle  of  how  he  would  ride  around  the  country,  like  Doc- 


BOYHOOD.  23 

tor  John  Collins,  his  ideal  of  manhood,  and  make  everybody 
well  and  happy.  Yes,  he  would  be  a  doctor,  and  know  every- 
thing. He  seems  to  have  inherited  the  best  traits  from  both 
his  ancestries,  developing  from  his  earliest  years  the  ready  wit 
and  quick  retort,  followed  by  the  joyous  laugh,  showing  the 
Norman  blood  of  the  Aliens,  while  it  was  accompanied  by  the 
calm,  conscientious  judgment  of  the  McCumbers, 

New  families  were  yearly  added  from  the  East  to  the  com- 
munity, and  all  the  wild  land  was  soon  in  the  hands  of  these 
settlers.  The  deer  were  fast  disappearing  from  the  forest  and 
the  trout  from  the  streams  as  sources  of  supply.  With  only  a 
few  acres  under  cultivation,  it  can  well  be  imagined  that  it  would 
be  a  hard  struggle  for  Father  Allen  to  make  a  living  for  a  family 
of  eio-ht.  He  was  well  educated  for  the  times,  and  ambitious, 
teaching  in  district  and  singing  schools  in  the  winter,  working 
the  farm  in  the  summer,  and  surveying  for  all  the  country  round. 
He  made  the  first  map  of  the  town  of  Alfred,  which  is  now  in 
Steinheim.  With  all  this  variety  of  work,  money  was  so  scarce 
that  he  was  compelled  to  take  for  pay,  produce,  or  whatever  the 
people  had  to  spare.  From  one  school,  the  only  money  he 
received  was  seventy-five  cents,  the  amount  of  the  appropria- 
tion for  that  district  from  the  State  funds. 

WORK  AT  HOME. 

The  children  were  obliged  to  help  about  the  work  as  soon  as 
they  were  old  enough  to  do  anything.  A  child  of  five  or  six 
years  could  pull  weeds,  drop  potatoes  or  corn,  and  do  many 
other  things,  so  that  each  member  of  the  family  was  often 
employed  from  early  morning  till  late  in  the  evening.  In  the 
busy  season  they  were  tending  the  stock,  chopping  the  wood, 
clearing  new  bits  of  forest,  sowing,  planting,  hoeing,  and  reap- 
ing, besides  doing  the  many  other  farm  duties  that  country  boys 
know  so  well.  This  intense  toil  for  bread  made  it  necessary  to 
be  astir  at  an  early  hour.  Five  o'clock  during  the  short  days 
and  four  o'clock  during  the  long  ones  seldom  found  a  healthy 
member  of  the  family  asleep.      Father  Allen's    "Hello,    boys!" 


24  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

was  not  a  very  unwelcome  sound  during  the  warm  season,  but 
in  winter,  when  in  those  open  log  houses  the  springing  out  of 
bed  was  often  from  under  a  snow  bank  into  one,  it  was  not  a 
pleasant  exercise. 

Needed  at  home  to  help  his  mother,  and  being  very  diffident, 
Jonathan  did  not  like  school,  yet  he  early  learned  to  read  and 
understand  books,  committing  many  things  to  memory,  among 
which  were  Logan's  "Lines  lo  the  Cuckoo."  He  often  said  its 
song  and  flight  first  gave  him  the  idea  of  a  world  beyond  the 
hills  that  surrounded  his  father's  house.  Being  left-handed,  and 
sensitive  to  ridicule,  he  did  not  learn  to  write  until  he  was  thir- 
teen years  of  age.  Only  a  few  newspapers  came  to  this  section, 
but  the  circulating  library  in  town  was  a  never-failing  source  of 
happiness.  His  brother,  Judge  Ormanzo  Allen,  writes:  "He 
never  cared  to  read  histories  of  war,  nor  the  lives  of  warriors, 
but  preferred  books  of  travel,  the  biographies  of  famous  men, 
such  as  Franklin,  or  Alfred  the  Great — benefactors  of  mankind  ; 
of  these  he  was  never  tired.  King  Alfred's  life  he  would  read 
and  reread,  till  many  of  its  pages  were  memorized."  Years 
afterward  the  "introduction"  of  this  book  composed  his  first 
speech,  and  was  the  first  elocutionary  exercise  in  Alfred  School, 
the  description  of  which  will  appear  later  as  he  tells  it. 

RICH  INHERITANCE  OF  POVERTY. 

Poverty,  when  accompanied  by  noble  parentage,  is  often  the 
richest  inheritance  of  the  young.  Habits  of  industry,  devel- 
oped by  useful  work,  with  frugal  fare,  make  strong,  healthy  bod- 
ies and  clear  brains.  Not  one  of  this  large,  struggling  fimiily 
but  that  in  after  years  made  a  success  in  life.  The  little  sisters 
became  educated  women  and  mothers,  a  saving  influence  in 
society  wherever  they  went.  Of  the  twin  brothers  one  is  a 
prominent  lawyer.  Judge  Ormanzo  Allen,  of  Austin,  Minnesota, 
whom  all  delight  to  honor.  The  other,  Doctor  Orlenzo  Allen, 
was  a  noted  physician  in  the  West.  He  was  loved  as  few  men 
are,  and  finally  gave  his  life  to  save  one  of  his  patients.  The 
eldest  son.  Deacon  Loander  Allen,  is  a  noble  Christian  man,  a 
trusted  counselor  in  church  and  town. 


BOYHOOD.  25 


SENSE    OF    JUSTICE    TRIED. 


Jonathan,  though  so  timid,  was  an  independent,  daring 
thinker,  and  bold  to  speak  when  the  right  was  in  question. 
Going  one  winter  to  school  to  his  father,  his  sense  of  justice 
was  sorely  tried  by  being  severely  punished  for  offenses  that 
were  simply  reproved  in  the  other  children.  At  home  one 
night  he  took  the  matter  in  hand  and  asked  his  father  thereason 
of  this  injustice.  His  father  said  that  he  did  not  wish  to  appear 
partial  to  his  own  son.  Although  this  was  not  fully  satisfactory 
to  the  boy,  it  made  him   better  understand  his  father's  motives. 

Another  instance  occurred  about  this  time  which  illustrates 
his  moral  courage,  but  which  shook  his  confidence  in  the  judg- 
ment of  others.  He  had  thought  of  his  Grandfather  Burdick 
as  the  most  perfect  of  men.  He  had  also  noticed  that  the 
whisky  which  people  drank  made  them  act  foolishly,  but  every 
family  in  that  day,  whether  rich  or  poor,  must  have  a  jug  of 
liquor,  which  was  thought  to  be  as  necessary  for  health  as  the 
daily  food.  Elder  Eli  S.  Bailey,  of  blessed  memory,  deprecat- 
ing its  effects,  not  only  upon  church  members  but  upon  the  min- 
isters of  the  gospel,  made  a  circuit  of  the  churches  on  horse- 
back, and,  with  all  the  fervor  of  his  soulful  convictions,  his  logic 
and  eloquent  tongue,  portrayed  the  danger  of  this  practice.  He 
held  a  series  of  meetings  in  the  schoolhouses  and  churches 
wherever  he  went,  pledging  both  old  and  young  to  total  absti- 
nence. Jonathan's  whole  nature  was  aroused  by  the  truths  set 
forth,  and  he  was  among  the  first  to  give  his  name  to  the  pledge. 
On  his  way  home  he  ran  in,  as  usual,  to  Grandfather  Burdick's, 
where,  telling  of  the  meeting  and  of  his  pledge,  his  grandfather 
sneeringly  said,  "You  boys  must  think  yourselves  much  wiser 
than  your  elders."  This,  however,  did  not  cause  him  to  regret 
his  pledge,  but  the  grandfather  from  that  time  lost  much  of  his 
power  over  the  boy. 

SABBATH    IN    THE    HOME. 

The  Puritan  idea  of  the  sacredness  of  the  Sabbath  prevailed 
in  this  town.      In  this  family,  early  on  Friday  afternoon  the  farm 


26  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

work  was  put  by,  the  evening  duties  finished,  and  the  frugal 
meal  of  "hasty  pudding  and  milk  '  partaken  of,  then  the  little 
sisters  had  their  bath,  said  their  prayers,  and  were  snugly  tucked 
away  for  the  night.  In  warm  weather  the  boys  were  allowed  to 
go  to  the  near-by  swimming  pool  to  make  themselves  sweet  and 
pure  for  God's  holy  day.  When  in  health  the  whole  family 
were  regularly  seen  in  their  places  in  the  house  of  worship. 
Rev.  Hiram  Burdick  writes:  "When  young,  we  attended  the 
same  church,  and  in  warm  weather  we  boys  appeared  barefooted, 
clad  in  tow  or  cotton  cloth  shirt  and  pants,  with  straw  hats. 
Coats  and  shoes  in  summer  were  a  long  after  consideration. 
During  the  cold  season  homemade  suits  of  woolen  cloth,  with 
cowhide  shoes,  were  worn  by  both  boys  and  girls." 

Another  writes,  afterward  Dr.  Orlenzo  Allen's  wife:  "My 
first  memory  of  the  family  was  seeing  them  on  their  way  to 
church  as  they  passed  our  house.  Father  Allen  was  a  very 
handsome  man,  tall  and  noble  looking.  He  drove  a  span  of  fine 
gray  horses,  always  with  a  full  load.  The  two  pair  of  twins, 
each  pair  dressed  exactly  alike  and  sitting  together,  made  a  very 
vivid  impression  upon  my  memory." 

The  habit  of  attendance  upon  public  worship,  and  all  the 
early  influences  of  religious  culture,  proved  a  strong  safeguard 
to  the  virtue  of  this  community.  As  soon  as  homes  were  pro- 
vided, a  church  was  built,  the  members  giving  work,  lumber, 
nails,  shingles,  and  anything  needed  that  they  could  provide. 
Missionaries  were  sent  out,  receiving  one-half  bushel  of  wheat 
per  day  for  their  labors.  The  minister  was  to  receive  what  was 
in  the  heart  of  each  to  give. 

SOCIAL    LIFE    OF    PIONEERS. 

The  social  life  of  a  pioneer  people  usually  will  take  the  form 
of  meetings  for  mutual  assistance — bees,  loggings,  raisings, 
sheep-shearings,  huskings,  apple-cuts,  quiltings,  or  spinning 
bees.  Men,  women,  and  children  attended  and  lent  a  hand 
wherever  needed.  The  evenings  thus  spent  often  made  bright 
and  restful  the  hard  day's  work.     All  their  interests  were  freely 


BOYHOOD.  27 

discussed — school,  church,  politics,  or  any  news  from  the  outside 
world. 

Young  Allen,  strong  and  large  for  his  age,  was  a  very  essen- 
tial factor  in  these  g£,therings,  from  which  he  treasured  every 
new  thought.  This  habit  of  attention,  and  of  selecting  from 
all  sources  the  best  that  was  given,  made  him  the  thorough  and 
versatile  scholar  that  he  became  in  after  years.  President  Allen 
often  said  that  his  memory  by  nature  was  no  better  than  that  of 
most  boys,  but  he  worked  over  each  new  thought  till  it  was  his 
own,  never  to  be  forgotten.  During  his  whole  life  the  early 
morning  hours  were  to  him  the  best  of  the  day,  and  from  his 
home  on  that  lovely  hillside  he  could  see  the  first  blush  of  the 
sun  rising  over  the  opposite  mountain,  covered  with  pines.  No 
Parsee  ever  worshiped  with  more  zeal  than  did  this  boy  this 
divine  and  daily  miracle.  The  deepest  grief  of  his  boyhood  came 
when  it  was  necessary  for  the  family  to  give  up  the  home  and 
move  a  mile  away,  into  a  deep,  narrow  valley,  where  the  forest- 
covered  hills  hid  the  morning  sun  from  view.  He  was  now 
thirteen  years  of  age,  thirsting  for  knowledge,  but  with  such 
limited  opportunities  for  study  that  the  future  outlook  was  dark, 
and  began  to  have  its  depressing  influence  upon  his  strong, 
buoyant  nature. 


CHAPTER    III. 

SELECT    SCHOOL    ESTABLISHED. 

IN    the  fall  of    1836,   while    chopping    with    his  father    and 
brothers  near  the  home,  a  gentleman  came  to  the  woods. 

After  a  pleasant  "good-morning"  he  said,  "I  have  come 
into  town  to  start  a  select  school,  and  would  like  to  have  you 
send  this  boy,"  designating  Jonathan.  "  I  can't  afford  it,"  said 
the  father.  Bethuel  Church,  for  this  was  the  man,  thought  a 
moment:  "We  shall  need  wood,  and  I  will  take  that  for  the 
tuition."  How  the  boy's  heart  bounded  when  the  father  said, 
"  If  he  will  chop  it,  he  can  go."  As  four-foot  wood  was  only 
fifty  cents  a  cord,  it  would  take  six  cords  to  pay  the  $3.00 
tuition.  If  it  had  taken  sixty  it  would  not  have  daunted  the 
boy.  There  was  light  and  life  ahead.  But  as  father  and 
mother  talked  over  before  him  the  pros  and  cons  in  the  evening, 
it  was  made  evident  that  he  had  nothing  suitable  to  wear,  and 
new  clothing  was  out  of  the  question,  so  father  said,  "Jonathan, 
I  believe  you  must  give  it  up."  Argument  was  not  thought  of 
in  that  New  England  household,  but  the  tears  would  come  in 
spite  of  all  the  manly  will  to  repress  them.  His  father  seeing 
this,  and  remembering  his  promise,  said,  "  If  he  feels  like  that, 
he  must  go."  His  roundabout  was  made  as  presentable  as 
possible,  and  he  went,  carrying  a  chair  for  his  seat,  as  each  of 
the  others  did.  He  has  often  said  that  with  the  memory  of 
that  experience  he  could  never  refuse  taking  wood  as  tuition 
from  students.  The  encouragement  thus  given  might  be  the 
turning  point  in  some  other  life. 

Two  miles  over  a  high,  bleak  hill,  thinly  clad,  and  through 
snowdrifts  often  covering  the  fences,  might  not  seem  a  pleasant 
prospect  to  the  schoolboy  now,  but  to  him   it  was  a  daily  joy, 

(28) 


SELECT    SCHOOL    ESTABLISHED.  29 

and,  though  he  dared  not,  from  fear  of  ridicule,  eat  the  cold 
johnnycake  that  was  his  dinner,  till  on  his  return  home  at  night, 
he  was  not  hungry.  There  were  no  desks,  so  each  pupil  had 
to  hold  his  books  and  slate  as  best  he  could  till  boards  could  be 
fitted  up  for  that  purpose.  There  were  thirty-seven  pupils,  all 
gathered  from  Alfred  and  vicinity,  save  two  from  Genesee  and 
one  from  Rhode  Island.  Allen  was  the  youngest  in  the  school, 
and  the  least  advanced,  so  he  was  obliged  to  recite  alone  in 
arithmetic,  but  each  lesson  was  perfect.  After  a  week  Mr. 
Church,  looking  over  the  pupils  at  their  work,  saw  young  Allen 
at  work  even  beyond  the  others.  "You  there?"  "Yes,  sir," 
"Then  go  into  the  first  class,"  and  before  the  term  was  out  he 
was  one  of  the  best  in  the  most  advanced  class.  In  this  select 
school  blackboards  and  other  new  methods  were  first  intro- 
duced. 

FIRST    DECLAMATION. 

Of  his  first  experience  in  elocution  or  declamation  it  is 
written:  "Then  came  compositions.  Our  young  student  often 
found  himself,  as  Virgil  says,  'a  goose  among  swans,'  for  he 
could  hardly  write  his  own  name,  much  less  a  composition.  As 
a  compromise  he  was  allowed  to  give  a  recitation.  Yet  with- 
out any  previous  acquaintance  with  anything  like  elocution,  he 
had  no  idea  how  to  proceed.  When  called  upon  for  his  piece 
he  commenced  to  speak  from  the  place  where  he  was  sitting. 
'Come  out  on  the  floor,'  said  the  teacher.  Utterly  bewildered, 
he  grabbed  a  fellow  pupil  by  the  collar  for  support.  'Let  go!' 
cried  the  pupil.  He  did  let  go.  but  saw  or  heard  nothing  till 
his  selected  paragraph— a  fine  passage  from  a  standard  author 
on  Alfred  the  Great— had  been  'elocuted'  almost  at  one  breath." 
From  this  experience  dates  his  first  determination  to  make  a 
speaker  of  himself.  In  his  boyish  way  he  put  into  this  new 
ambition  the  same  ideas  of  perfection  that  characterized  every- 
thing he  did.  He  committed  to  memory  many  passages  from 
his  favorite  authors,  and  began  writing  out  his  own  ideas  on 
various  subjects,  and  then  practiced  speaking  them.  He  not 
only  carefully  noted  the  subjects  of  sermons  and  lectures  that 


30  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

he  heard,  but  studied  attentively  the  manner  of  their  expression 
and  delivery.      Elder  Walter  Gillett  was  his  ideal  as  a  speaker. 

Mr.  Church  was  the  right  man  for  such  an  enterprise,  ini- 
tiative, positive,  enthusiastic,  and  having  great  faith  in  himself 
and  his  pupils.  He  preached  at  the  church,  as  well  as  taught 
the  school,  during  the  winter,  and  his  constant  theme  was  edu- 
cation. His  private  talks  to  both  old  and  young  were  of  the 
needs  in  this  community  for  a  high  school  or  academy.  Charles 
Hartshorn,  a  brother  of  Mrs.  Sheldon,  in  whose  house  the  school 
was  held,  was  just  from  the  East  and  taught  the  district  school 
a  mile  away.  These  two  men  most  earnestly  sympathized  in 
all  intellectual  work.  A  debating  society  was  formed,  having 
its  meetings  in  the  schoolhouse  evenings,  where  old  and  young 
from  all  the  country  round  were  invited  to  discuss  questions  of 
public  interest,  especially  those  pertaining  to  education.  So 
far-reaching  was  this  influence  that  the  next  winter  each  district- 
for  many  miles  around  had  its  debating  society. 

At  the  close  of  the  term  there  was  an  earnest  religious 
awakening,  in  which  many  found  the  Prince  of  Peace.  Jona- 
than Allen  was  one  of  that  number,  and  with  the  inspiration  of 
that  teacher,  and  that  winter's  work,  he  came  into  line  with  pro- 
gressive thought,  never  going  back,  but  always  pressing  for- 
ward with  a  strong,  high  purpose,  seldom  found  in  a  boy  of 
only  fourteen, 

MAKING    MAPLE    SUGAR. 

The  following  spring  he  went  into  the  sugar  camp,  always 
glad  when  an  uncommon  flow  of  sap  made  it  necessary  to  boil 
all  night,  as  he  would  then  have  a  quiet  time  to  read  or  study 
by  the  firelight.  Large  maple  trees  made  a  heavy  percentage 
of  the  forest,  and  were  a  source  of  comfort  and  profit  to  the 
farmers.  As  soon  as  a  few  warm  days  came  in  March,  the 
woods  were  penetrated  through  the  snow  by  the  ox-sleds  loaded 
with  s.ap-buckets.  The  trees  were  tapped,  a  clearing  made  for 
the  fire,  and  a  rude  stone  furnace  built.  On  this  rested  the 
large  iron  kettle  in  which  the  sap  was  boiled.  A  hut  was  built 
as  near  the  fire  as  possible,  where  a  few  bundles  of  straw  made 
seats  by  day  and  often  a  bed  at  night. 


SELECT    SCHOOL    ESTABLISHED.  3 1 

PLEASURE    AND    WORK. 

Though  so  earnest  in  study,  he  entered  into  all  the  sports 
and  games  among  the  young  people,  for  this  boyish  nature  was 
overflowing  with  a  quaint  humor.  Fox  and  geese,  hide  and 
seek,  ten  men  morris,  hunting  and  fishing  occupied  their  spare 
hours.  The  raccoon  was  a  source  of  great  mischief  in  all  the 
fields  and  gardens,  and  many  a  night  was  spent  in  trapping  and 
hunting  these  mischievous  marauders.  Wood  could  be  sold  at 
the  village,  but  sugar,  cheese,  and  lumber  were  taken  to  Bath 
and  the  Genesee  Valley  to  exchange  for  wheat  and  household 
necessities  not  to  be  procured  in  this  region.  The  general  farm 
work  began  early  in  the  spring,  when  the  stones  were  picked 
up  from  the  grass  lands.  Plowing,  sowing,  planting,  and  hoeing 
followed.  Absorbed  in  plans  for  the  future,  which  he  kept  to 
himself,  young  Allen  would  rest  now  and  then  on  his  hoe- 
handle,  so  that  these  daydreams  became  quite  a  source  of  pleas- 
antry with  the  other  workers.  As  soon  as  old  enough  to  carry 
the  chain,  he  often  helped  his  father  in  surveying,  thus  early 
learning  the  rudiments  of  this  branch  of  mathematics.  Going 
on  with  the  study,  he  in  time  became  independent  in  it,  and 
afterward  taught  surveying  in  the  Institution. 

The  winter's  work  of  1836  being  completed,  the  general 
interest  aroused  by  Bethuel  Church  and  some  of  the  older 
students,  led  to  the  publication  of  a  paper  on  education,  edited 
by  Daniel  C.  Babcock  and  Amos  W.  Coon,  and  printed  by 
Orra  Stillman.  These,  with  other  influences,  had  to  do  with 
the  erection  of  the  building  known  among  the  students  as  the 
"Horned  Bug."  Rev.  James  R.  Irish,  a  student  from  Union 
College,  came  to  teach  in  the  fall  of  1837,  teaching  for  two  years 
and  preaching  much  of  the  time  at  the  church.  Jonathan  was 
always  first  in  his  classes,  and  his  schoolmates  tell  how  ready 
he  was  to  assist  any  of  them  in  their  studies.  He  was  particu- 
larly clear  in  mathematical  demonstration.  In  this  way  he  not 
only  learned  to  teach,  but  to  plod  patiently  with  the  slow  but 
earnest  students,  leadino-  them  on  to  success. 


32  LIPE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

A  lumber  mill  was  built  on  Vandemark  Creek,  giving  to  the 
farmers  an  opporunity  to  earn  something  when  their  teams  were 
not  needed  for  the  farm  work.  Father  Allen  would  go  to  the 
mill,  get  his  lumber,  and  return  home  at  night  ready  for  an  early 
start  with  the  load  on  the  following  morning.  It  took  three 
days  to  go  to  Bath  and  return,  and  four  to  go  to  Hammondsport. 
As  there  were  several  teams  going  from  the  neighborhood,  Jona- 
than was  often  put  in  charge  of  the  load,  much  of  the  way  being 
through  the  primeval  forest.  In  these  long,  lonely  rides  he 
learned  much  of  nature  in  her  varying  moods.  The  birds  were 
his  especial  friends;  he  knew  the  note  of  each  with  a  certainty 
that  never  failed.  How  he  would  welcome  those  of  earliest 
spring!  How  he  exulted  in  their  freedom  as  their  graceful 
wings  cut  the  air!  He  never  would  allow  the  children  a  canary 
as  an  imprisoned  pet.  When  the  cuckoo  made  her  rare  visits 
to  our  orchard,  he  never  failed  to  call  me  to  share  his  pleasure ; 
the  thrill  of  music  that  filled  every  tree  top  with  melody,  made 
the  morning  hours  the  richest  of  the  day.  His  love  of  early 
hours  grew  with  his  advancing  years. 

WILLIAM    C.     KENVON     AS    TEACHER. 

Mr.  Irish  having  been  ordained  and  taken  the  pastorate  of 
the  church,  William  C.  Kenyon  took  control  of  the  school  in 
the  spring  term  of  1839,  with  twenty-five  scholars.  For  several 
terms  young  Allen  was  his  pupil,  and  was  impressed  by  this 
wonderful  teacher.  Later  he  writes  of  him:  "He  was  one  of 
those  slender,  compact,  nervous,  magnetic  men ;  a  man  very 
earnest,  very  incisive,  somewhat  radical,  even  eccentric,  if  you 
please,  yet  very  genuine.  The  first  sight  of  him  on  his  arrival 
here  to  take  charge  of  the  school,  stirred  one  young  life  to  the  core. 
The  first  address  that  we  heard  him  deliver  roused  and  thrilled 
us  as  no  other,  and  we  worked  for  days  as  in  a  dream;  his  teach- 
ing was  suggestive,  electric,  inspiring."  Rev.  James  R.  Irish 
said  of  Kenyon,  "He  will  get  up,  turn  around,  and  sit  down, 
while  I  am  getting  up." 

At  seventeen  young  Allen  was  prepared  for  teaching,  and 
began  his  work  in  a  district  some  eight  miles  from  home.      Many 


SELECT    SCHOOL    ESTABLISHED.  33 

of  his  pupils  were  older  than  himself,  and  some  of  them  belonged 
to  that  rough  element  so  common  in  new  settlements.  They 
gloried  in  rowdyism,  and  boasted  that  they  had  often  had  three 
or  four  teachers  during  the  winter.  With  some  heroic  treat- 
ment he  went  through  the  entire  time  for  which  he  was  hired, 
the  last  weeks  being  the  best  part  of  his  work,  and  what  was 
still  better,  he  was  not  disgusted  with  teaching.  When  he  was 
eighteen  he  arranged  to  go  down  the  Alleghany  River  with  the 
lumbermen  to  Cincinnati.  This  would  give  him  an  opportunity 
to  see  the  world  and  earn  some  money  for  books  and  study. 
Many  an  air-castle  was  built  on  this  plan,  even  to  his  going  as 
far  as  New  Orleans.  His  brother.  Judge  Allen,  writes  that  his 
mother  could  not  give  her  consent  to  this,  so  he  gave  up  this 
fairy  dream  and  went  back  for  the  spring  to  the  old  sugar-camp 
and  humdrum  life  he  knew  so  well.  He  had  books  now,  and 
every  leisure  hour  was  devoted  to  reading  and  study.  He  was 
never  satisfied  till  he  had  mastered  a  subject,  not  as  mere  knowl- 
edge, but  as  something  to  be  a  part  of  himself. 

PUBLIC   EXHIBITION. 

The  school  closed  with  a  public  examination  of  each  class, 
and  was  followed  by  speaking,  reading,  and  dialogues,  in  which 
most  of  the  pupils  took  part.  At  the  close  of  the  spring  term 
of  1 84 1  Mrs.  Susan  Spicer  writes: — 

"The  house  was  crowded.  The  interest  of  the  evening 
centered  in  a  dramatic  scene  in  which  Jonathan  Allen,  then  a 
leading  student  in  the  academy,  bore  a  conspicuous  part.  The 
engrossing  subject  throughout  the  North  was  the  slavery  ques- 
tion. Professor  Kenyon  was  a  man  of  uncompromising  anti- 
slavery  sentiment.  The  recapture  of  slaves  was  then  a  com- 
mon occurrence  in  the  North,  and  a  case  of  that  kind  had 
recently  occurred,  accompanied  with  more  than  the  usual  atroc- 
ities. Young  Allen,  then  eighteen,  proposed  to  the  students 
to  reproduce  that  scene  at  this  school  exhibition  by  an  original 
dialogue.  Mr,  Allen  represented  the  good  Quaker  who  had 
befriended,  housed,  and  fed  the  fleeing  fugitives,  and  proposed 
to  forward  them  on  to  Canada.      The  fugitives  were  represented 


34  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

by  Students  in  tattered  garments  with  blackened  faces  and  hands, 
while  others  represented  the  pursuing  slaveholders,  officers,  and 
assisting  citizens.  The  slaves  were  seized  at  the  home  of  the 
good  Quaker.  A  neighbor  suggested  that  the  cursed  Quaker 
be  ridden  on  a  rail,  tarred,  and  feathered,  which  they  proceeded 
to  do.  Mr.  Allen  was  entirely  submissive,  but  talked  to  them 
plainly  of  the  cruel  inhumanity  of  their  system  of  slavery, 
sharply  denouncing  their  brutal  practices,  then,  finally  raising 
his  voice  in  cutting  rebuke,  he  reached  a  climax  unanticipated 
even  by  himself.  In  impassioned,  eloquent  terms  he  told  them 
that  their  acts  would  react  against  them ;  that,  instead  of  sup- 
pressing the  antislavery  sentiments,  they  would  intensify  and 
.extend  them;  that  every  abuse  of  this  kind  would  raise  up  for 
them  one  hundred  more  friends;  that  in  a  little  time  the  pen, 
the  press,  and  all  the  better  elements  of  the  North  would  array 
themselves  against  them.  Then  he  made  the  following  state- 
ments: 'God  will  not  permit  such  an  institution  to  exist  in 
America  much  longer.  Even  now  I  seem  to  hear  its  death 
knell.  God's  repressing  hand  is  laid  upon  you.  The  days  of 
slavery  are  already  numbered,  though  it  will  die  only  after  a 
hard  struggle.  It  will  die  only  after  a  baptism  of  our  whole 
country  in  blood.  Twenty  years  from  now  an  antislavery  Presi- 
dent will  be  elected.  You  of  the  South  will  rebel  and  endeavor 
to  establish  a  slaveholder's  oligarchy.  The  North  will  not  sub- 
mit to  the  dissolution  of  these  States,  and  a  fearful  carnage  will 
follow.  Slavery  will  be  abolished,  and  God  will  preserve  the 
nation.  May  God  be  merciful  to  the  people.  God  save  the 
poor  and  oppressed.'  The  interest  in  the  narrative  centers  in 
the  mystery  of  young  Allen's  prophesying  coming  events  so 
definitely." 

At  the  first  meeting  in  Chapel  Hall  in  1861  to  consider  the 
call  of  the  government  for  volunteers  to  meet  the  new  emer- 
gency, in  which  Professor  Allen  took  a  leading  part,  the  writer 
of  these  pages  rehearsed  the  forecast  of  twenty  years  previous, 
and  the  narrative  acted  like  magic.  Professor  Allen  then  looked 
back  upon  that  impromptu  forecast  as  inexplicable  except  as  it 
was  born  of  faith. 


GMAPTER    IW. 

PIONEER    LIFE    IN    WISGONSIM. 

EACHING  in  winter,  going  to  school  whenever  possible, 
and  working  on  the  farm,  filled  up  the  next  year,  when 
the  family  decided  to  go  to  Wisconsin — a  section  just 
opened  to  settlers. 

My  first  memory  of  Jonathan  Allen  was  in  the  spring  term 
of  1842.  My  sister,  Harriet  Maxson,  five  years  my  senior, 
and  myself  were  living  at  Mr.  Irish's,  who  one  day  said,  "  I  have 
just  told  Abram  Allen  that  if  he  takes  his  son  Jonathan  to  Wis- 
consin, he  will  become  its  governor."  "Not  one  of  my  boys," 
said  Mr.  Allen.  "That  one  has  a  two-story  head,  I  said," 
remarked  Mr.  Irish.  There  was  to  be  recitations  that  after- 
noon, so  I  asked  my  sister  if  she  knew  the  governor.  "Why, 
yes."  "Show  him  to  me."  During  that  afternoon,  when  a  tall, 
diffident  young  man  came  upon  the  stage,  she  whispered, 
"There  is  the  governor."  No  doubt  lacking  confidence,  he  was 
not  quite  a  silly  girl's  idea  of  that  great  dignitary.  He  was 
then  nineteen,  and  in  a  few  weeks  went  West  with  his  family, 
where  his  father  and  mother  had  hoped  to  have  the  children  all 
around  them  in  their  declining  years. 

Uncle  Ethan  Burdick  was  already  in  Milton,  Wisconsin, 
while  Uncle  George,  with  several  other  families,  accompanied 
ours  on  the  journey  there.  Deacon  L.  Allen  says  of  this  time: 
"The  three  families  numbered  twenty-four  souls,  all  to  be  housed 
in  a  building  twenty-four  by  eighteen,  while  the  new  houses 
were  being  built;  but  it  was  in  summer  time;  the  sweet  hay 
made  nice  beds  for  us  boys,  while  the  chamber  floor  was  at 
night  covered  with  beds  for  the  little  ones."  Here  Jonathan 
worked  on  the  farm,  did  surveying  in  the  summers,  and  taught 

(35) 


36  LIFE    OF     PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

school  for  two  winters.  Walking  five  miles  across  the  prairie 
to  his  school  one  morning  in  the  face  of  a  terrible  blizzard,  he 
found  when  reaching  the  schoolhouse  that  breathing  was  almost 
impossible.  The  effect  of  this  lasted  all  winter.  No  doubt 
that  terrible  experience  weakened  the  valves  of  the  heart  and 
laid  the  foundation  of  his  heart  disease.  Nature  had  built  him 
with  a  wonderfully  strong  body,  and  healthful  exercise,  with 
plain  food,  gave  him  almost  a  giant's  strength. 

Much  of  the  land  in  that  section  belonged  to  "Uncle  Sam," 
he  giving  to  all  who  would  make  homes  upon  it  a  farm  for  the 
small  sum  of  $1.25  per  acre.  Soil  was  so  rich  that  it  yielded 
immense  crops,  with  very  little  cultivation.  Deer  and  wild  fowl 
were  plentiful,  and  the  streams  teemed  with  fish.  Going  down 
to  Rock  River  with  his  brothers  one  winter's  day,  they  made  a 
hole  in  the  ice  to  fish  through,  but  the  fish  came  up  in  such 
quantities  that  they  threw  away  their  hooks  and  gathered  them 
in  by  the  basketful.  When  they  had  secured  several  barrels  of 
these  great  salmon,  they  drove  home,  giving  liberally  to  their 
neighbors,  and  having  sufficient  for  themselves  for  the  whole 
season. 

DECIDED    FOR    AN     EDUCATION. 

Being  now  twenty-one  years .  of  age,  Allen  found  himself 
with  money  enough  to  take  up  a  quarter  section  of  land  in  the 
spring  of  1844.  This  his  father  and  mother  felt  very  anxious 
for  him  to  do.  He  started  one  morning  for  the  land  office  at 
Milwaukee  some  fifty  miles  away,  walking  all  the  long  day — 
thinking,  thinking — his  steps  growing  slower  and  slower  as  he 
walked  on.  He  knew  that  if  he  should  take  up  the  land  he 
must  give  up  all  that  he  held  most  dear — and  for  what? — a  mess 
of  pottage.  Should  he  starve  his  soul  for  a  little  of  this  world's 
goods .^  He  could  not  do  it,  but  he  would  not  be  rash.  He 
stopped  for  the  night  outside  the  city  at  a  farmhouse,  where 
he  slept  and  dreamed  over  the  matter.  Before  morning  the 
decision  was  made.  That  money  would  take  him  to  school  at 
Alfred;  strong  arms  would  do  the  rest.  The  die  was  cast.  He 
had  turned  his  back  upon  wealth.      He  walked;  he  ran;  and, 


PIONEER    LIFE    IN    WISCONSIN.  -i^ 

reaching  home,  said,  "I  must  have  an  education;  I  have  the 
money  and  must  go  back  to  Alfred."  No  objection  was  raised, 
but  all  the  help  possible  from  the  loving  hearts  of  father,  mother, 
brothers,  and  sisters  was  given.  It  was  hardest  to  part  from 
the  little  sisters,  then  just  blooming  into  young  womanhood; 
but  he  would  make  a  way  for  them,  v/hich  he  afterwards  did. 
The  first  boat  of  spring,  coming  down  the  lakes,  through  rough 
waves,  and  storm  and  sleet,  bore  a  happy  young  man  back,  not 
only  to  his  childhood's  home,  but  to  the  means  of  intellectual 
and  spiritual  growth.  His  former  teacher,  Professor  Kenyon, 
Uncle  John,  Aunt  Katie,  and  many  of  the  old  friends  warmly 
welcomed  him.  Securing  a  little  attic  where  he  could  be  alone 
for  study,  he  boarded  himself,  usually  cooking  his  own  food. 
He  worked  during  the  recess  hours  and  vacations,  besides 
doing  many  extra  things  for  a  paralyzed  uncle  in  whose  house 
he  lived.      Thus  began  his  life  work. 

TEACHERS    AT    ALFRED. 

He  found  associated  with  his  model  teacher,  Professor 
Wm.  C.  Kenyon,  Mrs.  Melissa  Ward  Kenyon,  in  the  primary 
branches,  John  D.  Collins,  in  Latin,  and  Gordon  Evans  in 
mathematics,  Miss  Caroline  B.  Maxson  as  preceptress  and 
teacher  in  modern  languages  and  drawing.  Of  Mrs.  Kenyon  he 
writes  later:  "As  a  teacher  she  was  frank,  sincere,  cordial,  quick 
to  appreciate  effort,  slow  to  give  over  the  dull,  ever  the  friend 
of  the  diffident  and  uncultured.  The  poor  and  needy  student 
knew  that  in  her  a  friend  could  always  be  foijnd." 

Of  Miss  Caroline  B.  Maxson  he  writes:  "Among  the  few 
individuals  who  gave  life  and  character  to  this  institution  was 
our  preceptress.  Fitted  by  nature  and  culture  for  the  position, 
she  became  a  living  force  in  the  school.  With  a  high  range  of 
mental  grasp  and  sweep,  with  a  comprehension  of  the  subject 
to  be  taught,  clear  and  direct  as  light,  with  a  self-poise  that  no 
rudeness  could  jostle,  mild,  calm,  serene,  she  gave  a  helpful 
hand  to  the  diffident  and  the  discouraged,  and  with  winsome 
words  helped  them,  inspired  them." 


38  LIKE    OF    I'RKSIDENT    ALLEN. 

Scores  of  young  men  and  women,  many  of  them  preparing 
to  be  teachers,  were  a  constant  inspiration  to  each  other.  Dur- 
ing those  earlier  times  the  studies  of  the  young  men  and  women 
above  the  common  branches  were  much  more  diverged  than  in 
these  later  years.  Few  young  women  studied  the  higher  math- 
ematics or  the  classics.  They  were  not  known  to  speak  in  pub- 
lic, either  in  rhetoricals,  in  societies,  or  on  anniversary  occasions, 
but  were  confined  to  reading  compositions.  The  proper  style 
was  for  them  to  appear  on  the  rostrum,  two  by  two,  arm  in  arm, 
mutual  supports,  while  they  read.  Dialogues  and  colloquies, 
then  very  much  in  vogue,  furnished  the  only  exceptions  and  the 
only  opportunity  for  displaying  their  grace  of  action.  On  the 
other  hand,  the  young  men  very  seldom  studied  the  modern 
languages  and  never  the  fine  arts.  Two  bashful  boys  after  a 
long  and  anxious  consultation  determined  to  seek  the  rudiments 
of  high  art,  thinking  it  would  be  a  help  in  surveying.  To  this 
end  they  blushingly  presented  themselves  to  the  teacher  as  can- 
didates for  drawing.  With  irrepressible  humor  twinkling  in  her 
eyes  and  lighting  up  her  face,  she  replied,  "Young  gentlemen, 
if  you  desire  to  take  drawing,  you  need  three  things  to  begin 
with, — a  tow  string,  a  hand  sled,  and  a  yellow  dog."  It  is 
needless  to  say  that  they  beat  a  hasty  retreat  without  making 
any  effort  to  obtain  the  prescribed  drawing  materials. 

At  this  early  time  eleven  weeks  constituted  a  term.  There 
were  four  terms  a  year,  with  vacations  correspondingly  arranged, 
in  order  to  give  the  pupils  an  opportunity  for  teaching  during 
the  winter,  and  for  farm  work  during  the  summer.  The  school 
had  its  beginning  in  the  need  felt  by  young  people  of  limited 
means  for  opportunities  of  higher  culture  than  could  be  obtained 
in  the  district  schools,  and  on  this  broad  foundation,  irrespective 
of  sex,  it  has  risen  to  its  present  infiuence. 

ASSISTANT    IN     M  A'lHEM  A  IKS. 

Young  Allen,  as  assistant  in  mathematics,  often  had  large 
classes.  By  his  patience  and  thoroughness  he  won  golden 
opinions   from  his   pupils  and   from  all   that   knew  of  his  work. 


PIONEER    LIFE    IN    WISCONSIN.  39 

Though  having  very  Httle  time  for  social  culture,  many  lifelong 
friendships  grew  out  of  these  relations. 

Professor  James  Marvin,  Chancellor  of  Kansas  University, 
writes:  "My  first  view  of  Alfred  was  from  the  summit  of  the 
hill  overlooking  the  town  from  the  west.  It  was  the  12th  of 
August,  1845.  We  were  five  young  men,  with  a  wagon  loaded 
with  provisions,  trunks,  boxes,  bedding,  and  cooking  utensils. 
This,  with  a  weary  farm  team,  fills  the  picture  from  the  point  of 
observation.  Joel  Meriman  and  myself  were  passengers,  and 
new  prospectors  for  the  mines  of  learning  in  the  valley.  Little 
note  was  taken  of  the  objects  by  the  way  down  the  hills,  until 
one  of  the  company  called  out,  'Halloo,  Allen!'  to  a  tall  pedes- 
trian under  a  broad-brimmed  hat.  'How  do  you  do?'  The 
point  of  the  hill  was  too  steep  for  an  introduction.  We  only 
heard,  'All  right,  sir.'  But  as  we  moved  on,  our  driver,  who 
had  been  here  before,  entertained  us  with  wonderful  accounts  of 
the  mathematical  attainments  of  his  angular  friend.  'He  was 
pretty  near  as  good  as  the  boss  in  figures,  but  not  up  to  Sayles 
in  Latin.' " 


GliAPTER    W, 


THE     FRANKLIN     LYCEUM. 


HE  Alfred  Debating  Society  had  been  merged  into  the 
Franklin  Lyceum.  "This  association,"  Mr,  Allen  writes,- 
"though  unpretending,  was  very  effective  in  training  its 
members  into  free,  open,  vigorous  modes  of  thinking  and 
speaking — attainments  that  most  of  them  have  had  occasion  to 
use  on  the  broader  arena  of  the  world's  manifold  debates.  The 
early  wants  were  few,  three  candles  to  be  furnished  each  even- 
ing. The  by-laws  were  simple.  No  one  was  to  leave  the  room 
without  the  consent  of  the  chairman.  No  one  was  to  be  per- 
mitted to  speak  that  was  not  in  the  session  room  within  five 
minutes  of  the  ringing  of  the  second  bell.  The  leading  mem- 
bers were  the  learned  Sayles,  the  poetic  Collins,  the  logical 
Wardner,  the  humorous  Nye,  the  jocose  Smith,  the  accurate 
Pickett,  the  Byronic  Scott,  the  eloquent  Goodspeed,  the  good 
Van  Antwerp,  the  lucid  Evans,  the  analytic  Simpson,  the  saga- 
cious Marvin,  the  gushing  Manier,  the  versatile  Clapp,  the 
suave  Knox,  the  gentlemanly  Ford,  the  scholarly  Larkin,  the 
sedate  Merriman,  the  flame-tongued  Maxson,  the  susceptible 
Spicer,  the  political  Cameron,  the  Napoleonic  Burdick,  the 
thoughtful  Hurlburt,  the  pseudo- Byronic  Cross,  the  nimble- 
tongued  Rathbun,  the  phrenologico-fatalistic  Price,  the  calm 
Payne,  the  vivacious  Powers,  the  royal  Purple,  these  and  many 
more  brought  their  varied  talents  to  enrich  and  make  illustrious 
the  society." 

The  ladies  were  permitted  to  be  present,  listen  to  the  dis- 
cussion, and  to  read  the  papers,  but  were  not  expected  to  partici- 
pate in  the  debates. 

With  such  teachers  and  these  co-workers,  many  of  whom  have 
stood  high  in  almost  every  profession  and  walk  of  life,  it  is  not 
(40) 


TEMPERANCE    AT    ALFRED.  4 1 

Strange  that  most  of  the  modern  reform  movements  here  found 
active  adherents.  The  school  was  breezy,  and  sometimes 
stormy  with  the  reformatory  spirit.  The  dietetic  reform,  or 
vegetarianism,  was  practically  adopted  by  not  a  few.  Anti- 
slavery  sentiment  ran  riot.  Temperance  had  a  sharp  and 
triumphant  conflict. 

TEMPERANCE  AT  ALFRED. 

In  common  with  the  ideas  and  customs  that  generally  pre- 
vailed at  the  time,  the  first  settlers  at  Alfred  were  not  strictly 
temperance  men.  Dr.  H.  P.  Burdick  in  reviewing  the  temper- 
ance work  at  an  early  date  says:  "The  school  from  the  first 
became  an  active  and  efficient  worker.  Its  teachers  were  pro- 
nounced radicals,  not  in  temperance  only,  but  in  all  the  great 
reformatory  movements  of  the  age,  standing  like  prophets  on 
the  heights  of  reform,  pointing  the  way,  and  leading  up  the 
steeps  of  progress."  He  also  says  that  "  D.  E.  Maxson  and  J. 
Allen  went  from  place  to  place,  forcing  back  the  hosts  of 
intemperance,  and  holding  points  that  older  men  had  deserted 
on  the  first  approach  of  the  enemy.  'Old  men  were  never 
able  to  hold  these  positions,  and  we  know  you  boys  can- 
not,' was  said  to  them,  but  they  replied:  'No  man  dies  too  soon 
nor  too  late  who  dies  for  the  truth,  for  the  right.  Whether  we 
stand  under  the  temperance  flag,  or  fall  under  yours,  we  shall 
fight.  Strike  our  Institution,  the  educational  home  of  unborn 
generations,  with  lightning  if  need  be,  but  never,  while  the  life- 
blood  flows  in  our  veins,  shall  it  be  struck  with  rum  licenses.'" 

The  church  and  the  school  joined  forces,  and  a  general 
interest  was  awakened  in  the  town  Steps  were  taken  from 
time  to  time  till  they  finally  resulted  in  driving  rum  from  Alfred, 
and  it  has  been  free  from  the  curse  of  legal  liquor  selling  ever 
since.  May  the  spirit  that  has  thus  far  governed  the  good 
people  of  Alfred  in  keeping  away  evil  influences  continue 
through  all  its  coming  history. 


42  I.IFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

SCHOOLS  IN   LITTLE  GENESEE  AND  CERES. 

During  the  winter  of  1845-46  Mr.  Allen  taught  the  school 
in  Little  Genesee.  Miss  Maxson  was  teaching  in  Ceres,  four 
miles  away,  and  unconsciously  they  became  rivals  for  superior- 
ity in  methods  of  teaching.  He  received  fifteen  dollars  per 
month,  with  the  privilege  of  boarding  around  among  the  patrons 
of  the  school,  or  paying  his  board  out  of  his  salary.  Wishing 
time  for  study,  he  chose  the  latter,  making  his  home  with  the 
bright,  pleasant  family  of  Avery  Langworthy.  He  had  a 
profitable  winter,  doing  much  good,  and  gaining  the  hearts  of 
pupils  and  parents.  Little  Genesee  long  boasted  of  its  wonder- 
ful teacher. 

One  afternoon  the  Ceres  school  visited  that  at  Little  Gene- 
see, and  soon  afterward  the  Genesee  school  returned  the  visit, 
filling  the  old  schoolhouse  to  overflowing.  Miss  Maxson  found 
that  Mr.  Allen's  methods  with  little  children  surpassed  hers, 
and  adopted  them  the  next  term. 

Having  a  few  weeks  to  spare  before  returning  to  Alfred, 
Mr.  Allen  went  on  a  raft  down  the  Alleghany  River  as  far  as 
Pittsburg.  He  returned  with  some  extra  hard  cash,  and  with 
what  was  better, — a  deeper  knowledge  of  himself  and  of  human 
nature, — to  be  used  as  material  for  future  work. 

NEW  SCHOOL  BUILDINGS. 

Upon  returning  to  Alfred  to  study  and  teach  through  the 
summer  term,  he  found  that  the  growth  of  the  school  was 
demanding  new  facilities  for  its  departments.  The  trustees  not 
feeling  warranted  to  assume  the  responsibility  of  new  buildings. 
Professors  Kenyon  and  Sayles,  with  their  approval,  themselves 
took  up  the  work.  These  men  were  without  means,  but  they 
had  great  faith  and  began  the  enterprise.  They  borrowed 
ten  thousand  dollars  of  Samuel  White,  of  Whitesville  (a  great 
sum  for  those  times),  selected  and  bought  the  site  of  the  pres- 
ent campus,  then  a  native  grove.  In  this  they  planned  to 
erect  three  buildings, — a  gentlemen's  dormitory  thirty-five  by 
fifty  feet,  and   three  stories  above  the  basement,  to  be  located 


LOADINC    SAND.  43 

near  where  the  Steuiheim  now  stands;  a  similar  building  for 
the  ladies  was  to  be  placed  farther  south,  the  upper  story  of 
which  was  to  be  used  for  chapel  and  recitation  rooms,  with 
winding  stairs  leading  to  the  chapel  from  the  outside.  The 
Middle  Hall  was  to  be  the  home  of  the  families  of  Professors 
Kenyon  and  Sayles.  The  basement  was  to  contain  the  dining- 
hall  for  students,  with  board  at  one  dollar  per  week.  Mr- 
Allen  entered  with  zeal  into  every  plan  of  Professor  Kenyon. 
During  these  years,  Anniversary  day  was  the  great  day 
bofh  for  students  and  people.  Essays,  orations,  and  dialogues 
to  the  number  of  thirty-five  or  forty  were  given,  and,  though 
each  exercise  was  limited  to  time,  it  made  an  all-day  literary 
meeting.  People  came  from  many  miles  to  hear  their  sons, 
daughters,  and  friends.  For  many  years  the  gathering  place 
was  at  the  church,  one  mile  below  town,  but  on  Anniversary 
morning  July  4,  1845,  this  building  was  crowded  too  much  to 
warrant  accommodation  for  the  still  greater  numbers  who  would 
come  later  in  the  day.  "What  shall  we  do?"  anxiously  asked 
Professor  Kenyon.  "Go  to  the  grove,"  was  the  response. 
"But  nothing  is  ready,"  replied  the  professor.  "It  shall  be, 
sir,  for  the  afternoon,"  answered  Mr.  Allen.  "Go  ahead,"  was 
the  reply.  A  team,  hammer,  and  nails  were  soon  secured,  and 
an  assistant  provided.  A  load  of  lumber  near  by  was  used  for 
the  stage  and  seats.  By  the  afternoon  everything  was  in  readi- 
ness for  the  accommodation  of  five  hundred  people. 

LOADING  SAND. 

With  the  same  promptness  all  labor  was  performed;  no 
needed  work  was  unworthy  of  the  most  faithful  service.  That 
summer  vacation  he  was  Professor  Kenyon's  ready  helper 
everywhere.  The  new  buildings  were  going  up  on  the  hill,  and 
much  work  was  needed  to  be  done.  One  evening  the  professor 
said  to  him,  "You  may  go  for  a  load  of  sand  in  the  morning." 
"Very  well,  sir."  The  sand  was  drawn  by  oxen  from  a  sand 
bank  two  miles  distant.  Having  made  all  arrangements  the 
evening  before,  he  started  for  it  at  three  o'clock  in  the  morning. 


44  I^I1*'K    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

Finding  the  process  of  loading  by  carrying  the  sand  in  baskets 
to  be  very  slow,  he  hitched  the  team  to  the  back  of  the  wagon 
and  drew  it  up  the  bank,  in  order  that  the  shoveling  could  be 
done  directly  into  it.  This  hastened  the  work  so  much  that  he 
was  able  to  return  with  the  load  before  breakfast.  As  he  did 
not  seem  at  all  hurried  afterward.  Professor  Kenyon  said  in  his 
quick,  imperative  way,  "Young  man,  isn't  it  about  time  you 
were  getting  ready  to  go  for  the  sand?"  "It  is  here,  sir,"  was 
the  surprising  reply.  Before  this  time  it  had  always  taken 
until  noon  to  get  a  load,  but  now  four  loads  instead  of  two  were 
brought  each  day. 

MAKINC    URICK. 

Rev.  Nathan  Wardner,  of  Milton,  Wisconsin,  writes:  "Dur- 
ing the  vacation  of  1846,  while  together  making  brick  for  the 
new  buildings,  Mr,  Allen  and  myself  had  many  talks  about  our 
future  life  work.  Neither  of  us  had  decided  whether  it  would 
be  teaching  or  the  ministry.  He  had  been  called  to  take 
charge  of  the  new  academy  at  Milton,  Wisconsin,  and  I  had 
received  an  invitation  to  teach  in  De  Ruyter  Institute.  He 
proposed  that  I  should  take  the  work  at  Milton,  and  he  go  to 
De  Ruyter.  The  matter  had  not  been  settled  when  the  call 
came  to  me  from  the  China  mission,  and  Professor  Kenyon 
persuaded  Mr.  Allen  to  remain  at  Alfred.  He  had  often 
expressed  a  desire  to  work  in  the  foreign  mission  field,  and  for 
many  years  afterward  I  looked  to  the  time  when  he  would  join 
me  in  China." 

Mr.  Allen  never  gave  up  the  idea  of  foreign  mission  work 
until,  in  1858,  having  a  call  to  join  our  Palestine  Mission,  he 
accepted  it.  We  were  partially  packed  for  the  journey,  when 
there  came  a  petition  for  us  to  remain,  signed  by  so  many 
students  and  citizens  that  we  concluded  our  work  was  here 
in  Alfred  instead  of  in  a  foreign  field.  He  never  wavered  in 
his  allegiance  to  this  chosen  work,  though  money,  position,  and 
honor  were  offered  him  at  different  times,  but  they  had  little 
attraction  for  him 


CARIN(;     FOR    THK    SICK. 


GENERAL  INTEREST   IN   SCHOOL 


45 


It  may  well  be  imagined  that  the  spending  of  $15,000  for 
material  and  labor  in  so  small  a  community  as  this  was,  made  a 
business  boom  in  all  departments  of  industry.  Carpenters  and 
masons  flocked  here  with  their  families,  who  must  be  housed 
and  fed.  Thus  naturally  a  great  interest  was  created  in  the 
school  throughout  the  whole  region  round  about. 

The  new  buildings  were  ready  for  the  students  in  the  fall 
term  of  1846,  and  the  opening  found  them  filled  to  overflow- 
ing. Board  was  put  at  $1.00  per  week.  Within  a  short  time 
(counting  those  who  roomed  in  the  village  and  came  to  the 
boarding  hall  for  their  meals),  the  family  numbered  from  one 
hundred  and  twenty  to  one  hundred  and  thirty.  Mr.  Allen  had 
charge  of  the  gentlemen's  hall,  and  Miss  Abigail  A.  Maxson, 
who  had  now  been  appointed  preceptress,  had  charge  of  the 
south,  or  ladies'  building.  She  had  been  away  some  years,  by 
request  of  Professor  Kenyon,  to  prepare  herself  more  thoroughly 
for  this  work,  and  had  taken  her  degree  at  Leroy  Seminary, 
afterwards  Ingham  University,  one  of  the  most  popular  ladies' 
schools  in  the  country.  To  fit  the  new  order  of  things 
unheard-of  regulations  became  necessary,  and  it  took  time  and 
patience  with  both  teachers  and  students  to  overcome  the 
friction. 

.CARING  EOR  THE  SICK. 

The  autumn  of  1846  was  a  sickly  season  throughout  the 
country,  and  this  school  did  not  escape.  A  number  of  typhoid 
fever  cases  occurred  among  the  students.  Care  must  be  taken 
of  the  sick  ones,  and  no  one  proved  so  calmly  masterful  of  the 
situation  as  did  Jonathan  Allen.  Spending  three  or  four  nights 
a  week  in  tenderly  nursing  the  sick,  besides  teaching  and  recit- 
ing in  from  eight  to  ten  classes  daily,  he  never  complained  nor 
showed  weariness  of  body  or  mind.  His  companions  said  he 
was  always  leader  where  strength  was  required.  It  was  true  of 
him,  as  he  says  of  another:  "He  could  easily  walk  forty 
miles  per  day,  could  chop  and  pile  more  wood  between  sun  and 


46  LIKE    OK    I'RKSIDENT    ALLKN. 

sun,  or  take  a  longer  swathe  in  the  hay  held,  than  any  competi- 
tor. He  worked  with  this  masterful  swing  and  stroke  all 
through  life,  doing  the  work  of  from  three  to  five  men,  never 
shrinking  a  pound  of  the  world's  burdens."  The  same  year  he 
was  chosen  superintendent  of  the  town  schools,  and  visited 
them  all.  While  becoming  better  acquainted  with  the  teachers, 
he  learned  much  of  the  needs  of  the  schools,  that  proved  to  be 
a  preparation  for  his  future  work. 

NEW  SOCIETIES  ORGANIZED. 

Up  to  this  time  Alfred  Academy  had  but  one  literary  society, 
called  the  Franklin  Lyceum.  Miss  Maxson  feeling  the  need  of 
similar  training  for  girls,  there  was  organized  the  Adelphian 
Society.  This  association  had  a  vigorous  growth  for  some 
years,  discussing  among  other  things  many  questions  of 
woman's  work  and  needs.  Mr.  Allen  gave  every  possible  aid 
to  this  new  society,  helping  to  frame  their  constitution,  select 
subjects  for  discussion,  as  well  as  helping  to  form  their  Rules  of 
Order.  He  procured  the  first  woman  who  came  to  Alfred  as  a 
lecturer.  This  was  in  the  spring  of  1847,  when  Mrs.  Elizabeth 
Oakes  Smith  came  as  Anniversary  speaker.  The  Erie  Railroad 
was  not  yet  completed,  and  staging  some  sixty  miles  was  no 
small  undertaking  in  those  days.  Her  presence  was  not  only 
an  inspiration  to  the  young  women,  but  her  eloquence  left  its 
impression  upon  all. 

The  Dedaskalian,  or  Teachers'  Association,  was  formed  the 
same  year  for  both  men  and  women.  The  Theological  Society 
was  also  organized  on  the  same  basis,  and  contained  about 
equal  numbers  of  young  men  and  women,  yet  the  young  men 
did  most  of  the  public  speaking.  This  order  of  things  once 
called  forth  such  a  question  as  this:  "Why  is  this  association 
like  a  man  with  the  palsy?  Answer — Because  the  stronger  half 
does  all  the  work."  Jonathan  Allen  was  a  leading  spirit  in  both 
of  these  societies.  The  Dedaskalian  spent  a  great  deal  of  time 
on  parliamentary  rules,  seventy-two  speeches  being  made  one 
evening  upon  a  single   point.     Papers  of  great  length,  full  of 


NEW    SOCIETIES    ORGANIZED.  47 

fine  analysis  and  criticism,    were  read.       One  that   Mr.   Allen 
gave  was  twenty  feet  in  length. 

The  Theological  Society  after  a  time  changed  its  name  to 
that  of  Christian  Association.  All  departments  of  religious 
thought  were  freely  discussed,  and  listened  to  by  full  houses. 
Its  members  became  the  leaders  of  evangelical  work  in  the 
neighboring  school  districts.  They  visited  from  house  to  house, 
holding  Bible  classes  and  prayer  meetings.  These  often  became 
the  nucleus  of  continued  religious  work.  A  deeper  missionary 
spirit  was  created  in  1847,  by  a  visit  from  our  chosen  mission- 
aries to  China,  Rev.  Solomon  Carpenter  and  wife,  and  the  set- 
ting apart  and  ordination  of  Rev.  Nathan  Wardner  and  wife  to 
accompany  them  to  their  far-off  field  of  labor.  As  Mr.  Allen 
has  said:  "Pupils  attending  the  school  but  for  a  short  time 
caught  a  spirit  in  the  air  which  continued  to  animate  them  in 
after  years.  Though  the  amount  of  knowledge  gained  by  them 
might  be  small,  yet  the  impulses  received  were  great  and  lasting. 
The  seed  sown  was  good,  and  for  the  most  part  fell  upon  good 
ground,  where  it  has  grown  and  yielded  abundantly  through  the 
years." 


CHAPTER   \J\. 

OBERLIN. 

R.  ALLEN  having  completed  the  prescribed  course 
in  Alfred  Academy,  determined  to  spend  some  time 
in  advance  work,  especially  in  the  study  of  theol- 
ogy. Oberlin  College  v^as  then  knov^m  throughout 
the  country  as  not  only  a  radical,  anti-slavery  school,  but  one  in 
which  thorough  religious  training  was  a  part  of  the  college  work. 
This  he  decided  was  the  school  for  him.  Two  other  young 
men,  after  talking  the  matter  over,  determined  to  go  with  him. 
This  was  in  the  early  spring  of  1847.  They  had  to  travel  by 
stage  much  of  the  way  from  Buffalo  to  Oberlin.  They  reached 
Cleveland  on  Friday  evening  and  remained  there  over  the  Sab- 
bath. 

"Early  on  Sunday  morning,"  writes  Rev.  A.  C,  Spicer,  "Mr. 
Allen  said  to  his  companions,  'As  the  stagecoach  leaves  here 
for  Oberlin  this  morning,  I  propose  that  we  finish  our  journey 
to-day.'  The  plan  was  at  once  agreed  upon,  and  passage  was 
taken  on  the  big  four-horse  stagecoach  for  Elyria  and  Oberlin, 
Mr.  Allen  riding  on  the  top,  with  the  driver,  to  get  a  better 
knowledge  of  the  country. 

"On  the  next  day  we  made  application  for  entrance  into  the 
college.  One  of  the  first  questions  asked  was,  'When  did  you 
come  into  town?'  Mr.  Allen  replied,  'Yesterday.'  'But  [in  sur- 
prise], did  you  not  know  that  the  rules  of  our  college  forbid  all 
travel  on  the  sabbath,  and  give  definite  notice  that  no  student 
will  be  accepted  who  has  disregarded  this  regulation?'  'Yes,' 
replied  Mr.  Allen,  'we  had  catalogues  of  your  college.'  'Then 
can  you  expect  us  to  receive  you?'  'We  were  unavoidably 
delayed,  and    found    ourselves  in    Cleveland  on   Friday  night. 

(48) 


UNDERGROUND    RAIL.ROAD.  49 

Remaining  there  over  the  Sabbath,  we  could  see  no  reason  why 
we  were  not  at  liberty  to  ride  here  on  Sunday,  since  the  stages 
were  running  on  that  day.'  'Then  you  are  Seventh-day  Bap- 
tists are  you?  All  right,  ail  right.'  Soon  President  Mahan  and 
Professor  Charles  G.  Finney  entered  the  office,  to  whom  the 
young  men  were  introduced,  and  to  whom  explanations  of  the 
circumstances  were  given.  By  both  these  gentlemen  they  were 
cordially  welcomed,  and  were  treated  by  all  the  professors  with 
great  kindness,  and  excused  from  class  exercises  and  other  duties, 
on  the  Sabbath. 

"The  next  Sunday,  when  Pastor  Finney  gave  an  invitation* 
to  all  new  students  to  unite  with  the  church  during  the  time  of 
their  stay  in  school,  a  special  invitation  was  extended  to  Seventh- 
day  Baptists,  assuring  them  that  such  church  relationship  need! 
not  embarrass  them  in  the  keeping  of  their  own  Sabbath.  This 
invitation  was  accepted.  Mr.  Allen  afterward  remarked  that  he 
felt  assured  we  were  the  more  respected  for  the  determination 
to  maintain  what  we  thought  to  be  religiously  right.  Such  stead- 
fastness to  principle,  in  whatever  position  he  was  placed,,  was 
ever  a  characteristic  of  Mr.  Allen's  life." 

UNDERGROUND  RAILROAD. 

Oberlin  was  at  that  time  a  station  on  the  "Underground 
Railroad,"  and  Mr.  Spicer  relates  the  following  incident: — 

"Early  in  September,  1848,  I  found  myself  at  sunset  near 
the  Cottage  Hotel,  when  there  came  on  the  sharp  run  sixteen 
adult  negroes,  hatless,  coatless,  shoeless,  and  almost  breathless, 
crying  in  terror:  'Oh,  take  care  of  us  quick!  Our  masters  are 
coming!  Masters  are  coming!'  At  the  same  time  a  man  from 
another  point  came  on  a  running  horse  calling  out,  'Take  care 
of  those  men;  their  masters  are  in  hot  pursuit.' 

"A  Boston  gentleman,  as  quick  as  thought,  exclaimed:  'Come, 
follow  me,  boys.  Friends,  stay  here  and  guard  the  hotel,  and 
don't  one  of  you  look  toward  the  college.'  He  immediately 
led  the  way,  on  a  run,  to  Tappan  Hall.  Hardly  were  the  fugi- 
tives safe  there  before  the  pursuing  slave-owners  were  in  sight. 


50 


LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 


A  mass  of  college  boys,  citizens,  and  strangers  surrounded  the 
ihotel  and  the  streets  leading  to  it.  Thinking  this  unorganized 
force  needed  leaders,  I  went  after  Allen,  Larkin,  and  John  M. 
Langdon  (a  mulatto  who  afterward  became  member  of  Con- 
gress and  also  minister  to  Hayti).  By  the  time  we  were  on 
the  ground,  the  pursuing  party  had  arrived,  ordered  their  steam- 
ing horses  cared  for,  and  supper  for  themselves.  While  they 
were  thus  engaged,  a  council  of  war  vas  called  by  the  gentle- 
man from  Boston,  and  a  plan  of  action  soon  adopted.  Tappan 
Hall  was  to  be  left  seemingly  unguarded,  while  twenty  well- 
armed  men  were  to  keep  watch  within  the  hall  throughout  the 
night.  The  hotel  was  to  be  systematically  protected  on  every 
street  and  alley  leading  to  it.  The  guards  were  armed  with 
'^uns,  axes,  pitchforks,  scythes,  clubs,  or  whatever  else  could  be 
grasped  in  the  hurry.  Commanders  were  chosen  for  the  depart- 
ments, of  which  Allen  was  one. 

"That  night  was  full  of  subdued  excitement.  After  supper 
the  slave-owners  and  officers  were  out  scrutinizing  the  guards 
and  barricades.  They  returned  to  the  hotel,  evidently  consider- 
ing themselves  baffled.  Young  Allen  went  from  street  to  street 
among  the  men  and  boys,  counseling  them  to  hold  their  places, 
but  in  no  case  to  act  with  rashness  or  use  violence  except  in 
self-defense.  He  urged  the  colored  people  to  retire,  as  there 
were  fugitives  among  them. 

"A  few  hours  later  the  slave-owners  came  out  in  full  force, 
but  so  formidable  did  they  find  the  guards  that  they  soon  retired 
to  their  hotel,  never  entering  the  campus  in  which  stood  Tap- 
pan  Hall,  from  whose  dark  windows  the  excited  fugitives  were 
watching  every  movement.  About  one  o'clock  a  sheriff  ven- 
tured out  for  a  few  moments,  then  all  was  quiet  until  morning. 
At  early  dawn  the  force  of  pursuers  ordered  their  teams  and 
drove  to  Elyria  to  await  developments. 

"Two  days  of  quiet  followed,  during  which  plans  were  per- 
fected to  take  the  fugitives  to  Cleveland,  where  a  vessel  waited 
to  carry  them  to  Canada.  Friends  all  along  the  way  were 
informed  of  the  situation,  and  prepared  to  lend  aid  if  needed. 


WOMAN  S    RIGHTS    TOPICS.  5  I 

But  the  fugitives  were  guarded  by  such  a  force  that  they  were 
not  molested,  and  Mr.  Allen  and  other  members  of  the  escort 
saw  them  safely  on  board  the  boat  that  was  to  land  them  in 
Canada. 

SABBATH     DISCUSSION. 

"At  one  time  the  young  men  from  Alfred  were  challenged 
by  other  members  of  the  theological  class  to  discuss  the  Sab- 
bath question.  The  one  side  was  to  affirm  the  change  of  the 
day  by  divine  authority,  the  other  to  advocate  the  Sabbath  of 
the  fourth  commandment.  One  of  the  leaders  who  failed  in 
argument  made  the  seventh-day  students  a  subject  of  ridicule 
for  belonging  to  so  small  a  sect — 'a  denomination,'  he  said,  'not 
even  able  to  train  their  own  theological  students!'  This,  far 
from  turning  them  from  what  they  believed  to  be  God's  truth, 
only  made  them  the  more  determined  to  build  up,  in  the  near 
future,  a  school  where  our  own  young  people  could  secure  the 
best  of  advantages,  and  to  this  work  Jonathan  Allen  devoted 
his  life." 

woman's    RIGHTS    TOPICS. 

Though  Oberlin  was  co-educational,  it  was  conservative  on 
the  subject  of  women's  speaking  in  public.  Miss  Antoinette 
Brown  was  a  member  of  the  theological  class.  When  each 
member  was  asked  to  give  the  reasons  for  the  study  of  theol- 
ogy, Mr.  Allen  was  shocked  and  indignant  to  hear  the  professor 
say  to  Miss  Brown,  "You  will  not  be  expected  to  state  yours." 
She  immediately  arose  and  left  the  room,  not  being  able  to 
restrain  her  tears.  Afterward,  however,  in  the  presence  of  the 
class,  she  was  asked  to  give  her  experience  in  being  called  to 
her  work. 

The  Alfred  students  boarded  at  Professor  Fairchild's.  The 
discussion  of  "woman's  rights"  and  other  reform  movements  of 
the  day  were  agitating  public  sentiment  everywhere.  This 
question  was  often  discussed  by  the  professor  and  the  young 
men  at  the  dinner  table,  the  discussion  sometimes  waxing 
warm,  as  our  boys  always  took  the  woman's  side. 


52 


LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 


At  the  close  of  the  year  Lucy  Stone,  of  Boston  (now  of 
world-wide  fame),  refused  to  graduate  because  she  was  not 
allowed  to  read  her  own  paper.  This  annoyed  Professor  Fair- 
child,  and  one  day  he  asked  Mr.  Allen,  "How  do  you  get  along 
with  that  question  at  Alfred?"  "The  most  natural  way  in  the 
world.  If  a  young  woman  is  capable  of  writing  a  paper,  she 
ought  to  be  able  to  read  it,"  was  the  answer.  Many  years  later 
Lucy  Stone  was  invited  to  Oberlin  to  deliver  an  address. 

More  than  a  score  of  years  afterward,  when  President  Allen 
was  invited  to  deliver  the  annual  address  at  Oberlin,  we  were 
the  guests  of  President  Fairchild.  One  day  Mr.  Allen  asked 
him  how  they  had  finally  settled  the  question  about  the  young 
ladies  reading,  etc.,  etc.  "Oh,  the  girls  made  such  a  fuss  that 
we  were  obliged  to  allow  them  to  read  their  theses,  but  bless  God 
they  have  not  yet  asked  to  deliver  orations!"  was  his  quaint  reply. 

While  at  Oberlin,  Professor  Kenyon  wrote  often  and  freely 
to  Mr.  Allen  of  his  hopes  in  reference  to  building  up  the  school 
in  a  higher  plane,  even  to  the  establishment  of  a  college.  Mr. 
Allen  entered  warmly  into  his  plans,  and  pledged  his  whole  ener- 
gies to  the  work.  In  answering  his  last  letter.  Professor  Ken- 
yon said:  "Nothing  has  so  cheered  me  as  the  words  in  your 
letter.  It  will  take  time,  and  it  may  be  a  long,  hard  struggle,  but 
it  can  be  done." 

TEACHING    IN    MILTON,    WISCONSIN. 

In  November,  1848,  Mr.  Allen,  finding  his  health  not  good 
and  his  funds  low,  went  to  Milton,  Wisconsin,  to  teach  in  the 
new  academy  with  Mr.  A.  W.  Coon.  Mr.  Coon,  having  been 
one  of  the  early  promoters  of  the  educational  work  at  Alfred, 
now  became  one  of  the  pioneers  of  the  same  cause  in  the  West. 
I  mention  this  because  the  leaders  in  advance  work  are  too 
often  forgotten. 

That  winter  Mr.  Allen  spent  at  his  father's  home,  now  full 
of  bright  young  people,  his  father  being  the  jolliest  boy  among 
them.  His  mother  was  happy  to  have  her  eldest  son  at  home 
again,  and  the  love  of  the  sisters  expressed  itself  in  every  form 


TEACHING    IN     MILTON,    WISCONSIN.  53 

that  could  be  given.  It  may  well  be  imagined  that  the  winter 
was  a  pleasant  and  profitable  one.  He  was  solicited  to  remain 
as  principal  of  the  academy,  but,  considering  his  pledge  to  Pro- 
fessor Kenyon  as  sacred,  he  gave  up  the  pleasanter  path  for  that 
of  rugged  duty.  Returning  to  Oberlin  to  graduate,  he  then 
came  back  to  Alfred  near  the  close  of  the  spring  term  in  June, 
1849. 


GliAPTER  UN. 

GENERAL    A  D  W  A  N  G  E  M  E  M  T. 

SYNDICATE    FORMED. 

'^  I  HE  principals,  Professors  Kenyon  and  Sayles,  had  felt  for 
.JL  some  time  that  the  teaching  force  of  the  school  was  in- 
sufficient to  meet  the  growing  demands  made  by  the 
increase  of  numbers  and  the  call  for  classes  in  the  higher 
branches.  These  men,  with  the  preceptress,  Miss  Maxson, 
were  often  required  to  teach  from  ten  to  fourteen  classes  a  day. 
Much  work  was  also  done  by  assistants  who  were  students  pay- 
ing their  way  through  school.  Several  of  these  young  men 
were  consulted  from  time  to  time  about  plans  to  best  meet  the 
interests  and  demands  of  the  growing  work.  Afterward,  some 
of  these  became  connected  with  the  Institution. 

CO-WORKERS. 

On  the  Fourth  of  July,  1849,  Mr.  Allen  entered  with  zeal 
into  Professor  Kenyon's  plan  for  reorganizing  the  Faculty,  and 
forming  the  compact,  by  and  between  Wm.  C.  Kenyon,  Ira 
Sayles,  D.  D.  Picket,  J.  Marvin,  D.  E.  Maxson,  Darius  Ford, 
and  J.  Allen  as  associate  principals  and  teachers  to  build  up  a 
non-sectarian  school.  All  were  to  share  equally  in  the  govern- 
ment, teaching,  and  financial  management,  and  agreed  to  labor 
five  years  on  a  salary  of  four  hundred  dollars  per  year — the  re- 
mainder of  the  income  to  be  used  for  the  payment  of  debts  and 
needed  improvements.  This  arrangement  proved  no  exception 
to  the  universal  law  that  where  income  is  made  dependent  upon 
the  financial  success  of  any  enterprise,  it  begets  economy,  indus- 
try, and  thrift.  These  young  men  were  already  warmly  attached 
to  Professor  Kenyon  and  to  each  other  as  co-workers  in  student 
(54) 


<».t,-.^*. 


Ocw^^onc^.Co-  S, 


GROUP    OP~    EARLY    TEACHERS. 


C.ENERAL    ADVANCEMENT.  55 

life.  They  believed  in  him  and  in  themselves.  All  old  students 
will  recognize  Darwin  E.  Maxson  as  the  fiery  radical,  the  ready 
talker,  who  in  his  chapel  speeches  made  every  heart  to  throb 
and  every  face  to  glow,  Daniel  D.  Picket,  the  conscientious 
conservative,  careful  and  exact  in  all  things,  as  were  the  mathe- 
matical problems  themselves;  James  Marvin,  the  sagacious, 
balancing  power,  his  great,  loving  nature  softening  all  discord- 
ant elements;  Darius  Ford,  the  fine  scholar,  the  bright,  true 
gentleman,  never  believing  that  "wisdom  would  die  with  him," 
ever  ready  for  advanced  thought  on  all  lines  of  human  progress. 
In  a  few  years  Professor  Marvin  left  his  position,  he  having 
been  induced  to  enter  another  field  of  work,  and  Professor  E.  P. 
Larkin  was  called  to  take  his  place.  He  is  remembered  as  one 
of  those  thorough,  versatile  men  that  draw  mental  sustenance 
from  all  things;  he  had  traveled  extensively,  and  one  could  not 
converse  with  him  without  gaining  some  new  thought.  Such 
were  the  men  who  were  co-workers  with  Professor  Allen, 

marria(;e. 

During  the  week  following  this  compact  came  the  Anniver- 
sary exercises  for  the  year.  On  July  12,  after  the  speeches  and 
other  exercises  were  finished  (these  being  held  in  the  grove 
above  the  buildings),  Professor  Allen  was  married,  by  the  Rev. 
N.  V.  Hull,  to  Miss  Abigail  A.  Maxson,  the  preceptress. 

PROSPERITV    FOLLOWED    FAITHFUL    WORK. 

All  these  teachers  spent  their  spare  time,  including  their 
vacations,  in  repairing  and  fitting  up  rooms,  or  at  work  upon  the 
Institution  farm,  or  at  whatever  was  most  needing  to  be  done. 
At  every  point  Professor  Kenyon  and  his  wife,  Mrs.  Melissa 
Kenyon,  were  the  leaders  Professor  Marvin,  one  of  the 
syndicate,  afterward  Chancellor  of  Kansas  University,  writes: 
"With  exalted  hopes  and  enthusiasm  at  fever  heat,  we  entered 
upon  our  new  career.  The  school  increased  rapidly;  new  build- 
ings were  planned  and  erected,  more  land  secured,  the  farm 
opened  up,  and  the  question  of  assuming  collegiate  rank  and 


56  LIFE    OF    PRLSIDENT    ALLEN. 

honor  was  gravely  discussed  in  our  counsels.  We  were  prepar- 
ing many  young  men  and  women  to  enter  with  advanced  stand- 
ing in  other  colleges.  The  State  reports  gave  us  the  credit  of 
sending  out  more  and  a  higher  grade  of  teachers  than  any  other 
similar  Insiitution  in  the  State.  Why  should  we  not  have  the 
credit  of  the  work  done? 

This  increase  of  the  teaching  force  gave  all  better  opportu- 
nities for  study  and  more  thorough  work  in  the  class  room.  As 
the  examinations  were  public,  not  only  every  pupil,  but  each 
teacher,  was  put  upon  his  mettle.  President  Allen  writes  of  this 
time:  "It  was  the  aim  to  make  students  that  could  think  accu- 
rately and  speak  promptly  upon  their  feet.  One  class  being 
examined  at  a  time,  the  examination  created  a  good  deal  of  inier- 
•est,  and  was  listened  to  by  crov/ded  houses  of  citizens,  visitors, 
and  students.  This  tribunal  was  the  same  in  kind  and  quality 
as  all  after  life's  tribunals,  with  like  attributes  in  its  decisions." 
The  lady  members  of  the  Faculty,  Mrs.  Melissa  Kenyon,  Mrs. 
Sayles,  Mrs.  Allen,  Miss  Susan  Crandall,  and  Miss  S.  Coon, 
were  recognized  by  the  public  as  doing  no  less  efficient  work 
than  did  the  other  members  of  the  Faculty. 

Though  there  were  necessarily  changes  in  this  Faculty  from 
year  to  year,  still  the  growth  of  the  school  in  all  its  departments 
continued.  The  students,  whether  rich  or  poor,  came  from  all 
■classes  and  many  of  the  professions,  and  when  they  went  back 
they  carried  much  of  the  spirit  and  enthusiasm  gained  at  Alfred 
into  their  various  fields  of  life  work.  Alfred's  special  work  at 
that  time  was  the  training  of  educators  for  the  common  schools, 
more  than  one  hundred  of  these  strong-principled  young  men 
and  women  going  out  each  year  as  teachers. 

As  a  number  of  the  leading  teachers  belonged  to  the 
Seventh-day  Baptist  denomination,  and  as  this  people  had  long 
felt  the  need  of  establishing  a  theological  department  in  some 
school,  Alfred  was  thought  of  for  this  purpose. 

AGENTS    OF    EDUCATIONAL    SOCIETY. 

Professors  Kenyon  and  Allen  had  not  only  made  this  matter 
a  subject  of  thought,  l)ut  had  kept  it  constantly  before  the  peo- 


CENERAL    ADVANCEMENT 


57 


pie  in  their  denominational  publications  and  yearly  gatherings. 
These  men  considered  the  educational  interest  as  one  of  the 
most  important  in  denominational  work,  and  to  identify  it  with 
the  missionary,  tract,  and  publishing  associations,  it  was  thought 
best  to  have  a  society  organized  for  this  special  object. 
In  1852  an  Educational  Committee  was  therefore  appointed  to 
look  after  this  matter.  This  committee  drew  up  a  constitution, 
which  was  adopted  in  1854,  after  which  Professors  Kenyon  and 
Allen  were  appointed  as  agents  to  secure  an  endowment  fund. 
President  W.  C.  Whitford,  of  Milton  College,  Wisconsin,  says 
of  that  time:  "I  believe  that  it  was  impossible  for  any  other 
man  among  us  to  take  possession  of  these  different  interests  and 
opposing  forces,  and  to  combine  and  organize  them  as  he  did 
effectually  into  a  harmonious,  permanent,  and  powerful  move- 
ment. I  shall  never  cease  to  admire  the  addresses  which  he 
delivered  at  that  time  while  visiting  some  of  our  churches. 
They  were  the  most  masterly  discussions  of  certain  fundamental 
principles  which  it  has  ever  been  my  privilege  to  hear.  In  my 
opinion  they  have  never  been  equaled  by  speakers  in  any  of 
our  State  and  national  associations.  They  were  characterized 
by  a  most  comprehensive  grasp  of  the  vast  field  of  the  educa- 
tional work,  and  a  surprising  insight  into  its  various  but  associ- 
ated departments  and  results.  If  I  remember  rightly,  his  prom- 
inent theme  was  the  informing  and  uplifting  power  which  the 
school  exerts  over  the  family,  the  church,  and  the  civil  govern- 
ment." Again  he  says:  "  I  recall  at  this  moment  a  single  re- 
mark of  most  significant  import, — Tf  truth  were  offered  me  on 
the  one  hand,  and  search  for  truth  on  the  other,  I  would  most 
certainly  choose  the  latter.'  To  him  the  active  seeking  devel- 
oped far  more  than  the  passive  receiving.  A  single  idea  wrought 
out  patiently  and  clearly  in  our  daily  reflections  is  worth  more 
to  us  than  a  thousand  facts  simply  stored  away  in  our  memo- 
ries." 

Twenty  thousand  dollars  were  raised  the  first  year  by  these 
agents  of  the  Educational  Society.  In  1855  Alfred  was  chosen 
by  the  churches  as  the  place  in  which  to  establish  the  theolog- 


58  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

ical  department,  and  Mr.  Allen  was  elected  to  take  charge  of  it. 
A  number  of  young  men  and  women  of  different  denominations 
were  ready  to  enter  the  class,  many  of  them  having  previously 
been  active  members  of  the  Theological  Society.  These  young 
people  became  the  leaders  in  the  religious  growth  of  the  school 
and  surrounding  communities.  They  held  Bible  classes,  prayer 
meetings,  and  preaching  services  in  all  the  schoolhouses 
around.  Seldom  a  term  passed  witholit  especial  religious  inter- 
est being  aroused.  The  remarkable  feature  of  all  this  was  the 
deep-seated  and  quiet  work  of  the  Spirit,  so  that  we  seldom 
found  a  student  in  after  years  who  did  not  hold  to  the  higher 
impulses  and  awakening  which  he  received  at  these  little  meet- 
ings. 

This  work  extended  till  a  number  of  churches  grew  up  under 
its  influence,  such  as  those  at  East  Hebron,  Oswayo,  Roulet, 
Honeyoye,  Branch  of  Scio,  and  Bell's  Run;  and  the  University 
became  the  mother  of  evangelistic  work  in  all  that  section. 

BIRTH    AND    DEATH    OF    WILLIE. 

We  both  looked  upon  President  Kenyon  as  our  intellectual 
father,  so  when  a  little  boy  came  to  bless  our  home,  we  did  not 
hesitate  as  to  its  name — William  Kenyon  represented  our  ideal 
for  him.  We  never  thought  he  could  leave  us,  so  all  plans  were 
made  for  perfect  physical  and  spiritual  development.  He  was 
a  goodly  child,  with  a  promise  of  long  life,  so  when  he  left  us 
at  the  end  of  two  years,  we  felt  assured  that  had  we  known 
better,  practically,  the  laws  of  life,  our  boy  would  have  been 
spared  to  us.  Mr.  Allen  then  determined  to  know  enough  of 
medicine  to  be  able  to  care  for  his  family,  and  during  the  years 
that  followed  he  took  several  courses  of  medical  lectures. 


GliAPTER  Wlll- 

GOLLEGE  CHARTER  AND  GROUNDS. 

WINTER  IN  ALBANY. 

MOST  of  the  winter  of  1856-57  was  spent  in  Albany 
securing  our  college  charter.  Hon.  John  M.  David- 
^  son.  of  Wiscoy,  W.  W.  Crandall,  M.  D.,  of  Andover, 
and  Hon.  S.  O,  Thatcher,  of  Hornellsville,  were 
Alfred  students  and'  members  of  the  Legislature.  Mr.  Allen 
often  said  that  these  young  men  took  off  their  coats,  figura- 
tively, and  worked  for  the  bill.  It  was  introduced  early  in  the 
session  and  passed  the  first  and  second  readings,  but  there  it 
stopped.  Mr.  Allen  wonderingly  stayed  on  for  weeks  and  weeks, 
not  knowing  some  of  the  ways  in  Albany.  One  day  upon  ask- 
ing a  leading  member  in  the  House  why  the  bill  was  so  long 
delayed,  the  gentleman  laughingly  replied,  "  It  waits  the  bids." 
"What  do  you  mean?"  "You  know  that  here  we  have  one 
hand  before,  and  the  other  behind."  "But  how  is  that?"  ''In 
other  words,  how  much  money  is  there  in  the  bill?"  "Not  a 
dollar,"  was  the  prompt  reply.  "Oh,  that  makes  a  difference!" 
It  was  but  a  few  days  after  this  before  the  third  reading  was 
called  for.  The  regents  at  that  time  were  opposed  to  small 
colleges,  and  worked  against  the  bill,  the  State  superintendent 
and  all  his  under  officers  sharing  their  opposition.  These  depart- 
ments, almost  in  a  body,  were  on  the  floor  when  the  hour  came 
for  calling  the  roll,  and  to  their  utter  astonishment  the  measure 
passed  the  House  with  an  overwhelming  majority. 

Doctor  Woolworth,  that  grand  old  man  who  for  so  many 
years  stood  at  the  head  of  our  State  educational  interests, 
became  from  this  winter  an  earnest  friend  of  Mr.  Allen,  often 
consulting  him  on  educational  problems  for  the  growth  of  the 

(59) 


6o  LIFE    OF    PRKSIDFNT    ALLEN. 

work  throughout  the  State.  At  one  of  the  yearly  meetings  for 
the  regents  and  educators  of  the  State,  the  teachers  were 
thanking  him  for  some  changes  that  had  been  made  in  the 
examination  papers.  Pointing  to  Mr.  Allen's  seat,  he  replied, 
"Your  thanks  are  due  entirely  to  him  and  not  to  me."  While 
detained  in  Albany  that  winter  Mr.  Allen  attended  lectures  in 
the  law  school,  was  examined,  and  admitted  to  the  bar.  This 
was  not  with  the  idea  of  ever  practicing  law,  but  with  the 
thought  that  the  knowledge  thus  acquired  would  make  him 
more  efficient  in  his  chosen  profession. 

DUTY    ABOVE    ALL    HONORS    PREFERRED. 

He  had  little  desire  for  public  recognition,  and  all  honors 
conferred  upon  him  were  entirely  unsought.  In  1873,  when 
the  regents  of  the  State  of  New  York  at  Albany  gave  him  the 
degree  of  Doctor  of  Philosophy,  he  was  greatly  surprised.  As 
the  sacred  mantle  was  thrown  over  him,  Doctor  Woolworth 
remarked,  "This  is  well  deserved,  but  too  long  deferred ;  let  us 
telegraph  your  wife." 

President  Allen  received  the  degree  of  Doctor  of  Divinity 
from  the  State  University  of  Kansas,  in  1875,  and  in  1886  that 
of  Doctor  of  Laws,  from  his  own  beloved  university.  Impor- 
tant educational  positions  in  different  States  were  many  times 
offered  him.  but  his  chosen  work  for  Alfred  far  outweighed  them 
all,  so  he  was  satisfied  to  continue  his  labor  there  in  the  same 
sacrificial  spirit  in  which  he  had  begun  it.  The  recognition  at 
Albany  that  winter  of  the  work  hitherto  done  at  Alfred  not 
only  for  the  teachers  of  common  schools,  but  for  general  educa- 
tional interests,  gave  renewed  courage  and  zeal  to  the  friends 
and  teachers  of  the  Institution.  In  the  language  of  another, 
"Allegany  County,  and  all  southwestern  New  York,  owe  more 
for  the  high  standing  in  intellectual  and  moral  reforms  to  Wil- 
liam C.  Kenyon  and  his  co-workers  than  to  all  other  influences 
combined." 

In  1878  President  White,  of  Cornell,  Professor  Clark,  of 
Canandagua,  and   President  Allen,  were  appointed  a  committee 


COLLEGE    CHARTER    AND    GROUNDS.  0 1 

to  meet  with  the  presidents  of  Harvard,  Amherst,  and  other 
Massachusetts  institutions,  to  consider  in  what  manner  the  cur- 
riculum of  colleges  and  high  schools  could  be  harmonized. 

DIFFERENT    WAYS    OF    BOARDING. 

The  winter  of  1858  found  all  the  buildings  full  of  students. 
The  price  of  board  had  been  raised  to  one  and  a  half  dollars 
per  week,  yet  the  family  numbered  over  one  hundred  and  thirty, 
including  teachers,  students,  and  helpers.  Besides  these,  many 
from  a  distance  found  homes  in  the  town,  some  boarding  in  pri- 
vate families,  others  in  clubs,  where  a  number  provided  the 
material  and  together  paid  a  woman  for  cooking  it.  Still  others 
"boarded  themselves,"  that  is,  they  took  rooms  provided  with 
cooking  stoves,  and  often,  having  brought  provisions  from  their 
homes,  prepared  their  meals  and  did  their  own  housework. 
Brothers  and  sisters,  or  those  from  the  same  locality,  many  times 
lived  in  this  manner  while  pursuing  their  courses  of  study. 

It  was  not  an  uncommon  thing  in  the  early  days  for  a  young 
man  to  drive  a  cow — perhaps  many  miles — to  Alfred,  hire  some 
pasture  land,  and  pay  most  of  his  expenses  by  selling  the  extra 
milk  that  he  did  not  require  for  himself.  All  these  ways  made 
the  expenses  of  the  school  much  less,  and  gave  even  the  poorest 
an  opportunity  for  the  higher  culture  which  they  craved.  Such 
struggling  students  have  always  stood  among  the  first  in  their 
classes,  and  as  they  have  gone  out  to  the  world's  work,  many  of 
them  have  held  leading  positions  of  responsibility  and  influence. 

BURNING    OF    SOUTH    HALL. 

At  that  time  Mr.  Allen  and  myself  had  charge  of  the  ladies' 
building,  called  South  Hall,  while  Professor  Picket  and  wife 
took  the  gentleman's,  or  North  Hall.  The  new  building  for 
chapel  and  recitation  rooms  had  been  completed  the  year  before, 
and  the  old  chapel  in  the  upper  South  Hall  had  been  converted 
into  music  rooms,  with  one  room  reserved  for  the  ladies'  liter- 
ary society.  This  the  young  women  had  fitted  up  with  carpet, 
chairs,  library  case,  rostrum,  and  desk,  for  their  meetings.      It 


62  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

seemed  to  the  entire  corps  of  teachers  that  the  term  was  one  of 
uncommon  promise  for  the  winter's  work. 

On  the  morning  of  February  14,  it  being  Sunday,  some  of 
the  young  ladies  were  excused  from  appearing  at  breakfast  at 
seven  o'clock.  I  went  early  from  the  table  to  care  for  our  little 
daughter  Eva,  then  but  two  years  of  age.  On  entering  the 
building  I  heard  her  cries,  and  hastened  forward  to  the  bedroom, 
where  I  found  her  nearly  stifled  with  smoke.  Her  father,  fol- 
lowing, said,  "There  is  fire  above  us."  He  hastened  to  the 
room  above  and  discovered  a  blaze  between  the  clapboards  and 
ceiling.  "The  building  must  go.  Get  out  the  girls,"  he  said. 
This  was  done  with  dispatch.  Baby  was  quickly  wrapped  in 
her  father's  dressing-gown  and  given  to  the  care  of  a  trusty 
young  man;  the  sleepers  were  hastily  roused,  and  in  cloaks, 
some  in  their  stocking  feet,  rushed  through  the  snow,  then  sev- 
eral feet  deep,  to  the  new  chapel.  There  was  not  time  to  save 
everything,  though  the  teachers,  many  students  and  citizens, 
made  great  effort  to  do  all  that  was  possible.  Heroic  work  was 
done  to  save  Middle  Hall,  which  often  caught  the  flames,  though 
a  score  of  young  men  were  on  the  roof  working  with  buckets 
of  water.  They  stood  there  firmly  till  the  building  was  safe, 
though  they  afterward  carried  the  marks  of  burnt  faces,  hands, 
and  coats.  Elder  Nathan  Hull  and  Mr.  Allen,  from  their 
exposed  positions,  were,  as  it  seemed,  only  saved  by  a  miracle. 

The  houseless  teachers  and  young  ladies  were  all  welcomed 
for  the  time  into  the  homes  of  the  good  people  of  Alfred. 
Although  there  was  no  insurance  on  the  burnt  building,  imme- 
diate preparations  were  made  for  the  erection  of  a  new  one, 
which  was  to  be  much  larger  and  nearer  to  the  town.  In  little 
more  than  a  year  afterward  a  fine  brick  hall,  now  known  as  the 
Ladies'  Boarding  Hall,  was  ready  for  their  use. 

WORK    ON    THE    CAMPUS. 

The  new  buildings  begun  in  1845  were  placed  in  the  native 
woods  on  a  hillside  full  of  natural  springs.  This  made  the  soil 
above  the  hardpan  difficult  to  bring  into  shape.      Stumps,  logs, 


COLLEGE    CHARTER    AND    GROUNDS.  63 

the  debris  of  the  new  buildings,  the  rough  and  muddy  walks 
and  roads,  were  the  cause  of  many  a  disagreeable  experience. 

A  number  of  the  girls  asked  the  privilege  of  making  flower 
beds  during  their  leisure  hours.  From  this  beginning  there 
came  to  be  much  enthusiasm,  the  young  men  often  working 
with  willing  hands  to  help  them.  In  this  way  some  spots  of 
fine  annuals  made  bright  here  and  there  a  little  space  in  the 
general  unsightliness  of  the  place. 

Before  this,  in  order  to  keep  the  Institution  grounds  open 
down  to  Main  Street,  and  also  to  have  a  better  chance  for 
beautifying  them,  Professors  Kenyon  and  Allen  bought  the  plot 
of  ground  north  of  Mr.  Collins'.  This  was,  years  afterward, 
given  to  the  Institution,  and  a  fountain,  supplied  from  a  hillside 
spring,  was  placed  in  the  center,  while  trees  and  shrubs  were 
planted  round  about. 

After  the  South  Hall  was  burned,  in  1858,  Mr.  Allen  hired 
help  to  cover  the  debris  and  put  that  portion  of  the  grounds  in 
shape.  Thus,  little  by  little,  and  year  after  year,  was  this  work 
carried  on  in  the  spare  moments  of  those  most  busy  in  study 
and  literary  work.  One  spring  he  made  it  a  daily  task  to  go 
into  the  woods,  uproot  a  young  pine,  bring  it  down  on  his 
shoulders,  and  plant  it  at  the  noon  recess.  During  that  summer 
some  fifty-two  trees  were  planted  in  this  manner,  and  were  all 
growing  nicely  when  winter  came  on.  A  heavy  snow  lay  on 
the  ground  all  that  winter;  this  was  often  covered  with  a  hard 
crust,  so  that  it  would  bear  up  the  sheep,  that  came  over  the  tops 
of  the  fences  to  browse  upon  these  newly-planted  trees,  until  all 
of  them  were  destroyed.  I  myself  saw  from  my  window  the 
last  one — the  finest  tree  we  had — disappear  in  this  way.  The 
tears  would  come  in  spite  of  all  effort  to  overcome  them.  Mr. 
Allen,  however,  took  the  disappointment  philosophically,  as  he 
did  everything;  but  after  the  discouragements  of  that  winter, 
little  was  done  toward  beautifying  the  grounds  for  several  years, 
till  they  were  better  protected. 


64  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

"THE    PICTURE-SQUE." 

From  his  earliest  connection  with  the  school  Professor 
Allen  felt  that  beautiful  grounds  and  buildings  were  among  the 
best  of  educators.  He  desired  the  students  to  be  surrounded 
by  what  would  give  them  types  for  spiritual  achievements  and 
exalted  motives  for  all  they  did.  This  idea,  though  it  cost  him 
so  much  of  sacrifice  of  self,  was  one  great  power  in  his  life  work. 
He  had  many  ways  of  awakening  the  ideas  he  wished  to  impress 
upon  the  students.  Rev.  Frank  Place  says:  "I  shall  never  for- 
get, when  a  boy,  when  just  entering  the  academy,  the  first  chapel 
lecture  I  listened  to  from  Professor  Allen.  He  called  his  sub- 
ject 'The  Picture-Sque.'  It  was  easily  seen  that  he  had  long 
been  vainly  trying  to  have  an  unsightly  object  (an  old  barn) 
removed  from  the  campus.  For  a  few  moments  he  spoke  on 
the  real  beauty  of  nature  and  art,  and  their  influence  over  the 
human  soul,  then,  pointing  to  the  offensive  object,  by  sarcasm 
and  ridicule  he  set  the  students  into  roaring  laughter.  Becom- 
ing eloquent  over  the  subject  of  Greek  and  Latin,  over  ancient 
ruins  and  architecture,  he  would  suddenly  bring  in  the  idea  of 
bleating  sheep  and  calves  in  an  old  barn,  till  the  students  knew 
no  bounds  in  expressing  their  applause."  It  is  needless  to  say 
that  the  offensive  buildings  were  soon  afterward  removed. 

As  soon  as  the  grounds  came  under  his  immediate  care, 
books  were  bought  on  landscape  gardening,  and  a  systematic 
work  of  beautifying  was  begun.  The  ground  was  carefully 
surveyed,  and  walks  and  drives  laid  out  so  as  to  get  rid  of  the 
ugly  straight  lines.  These  were  also  raised  above  the  surround- 
ing grounds  by  dirt  and  gravel,  so  that  they  would  not  be  blocked 
by  the  snows  and  drifts  of  winter,  nor  washed  away  by  the 
rains  of  summer. 

THE    WORK    OF    BEAUTIFYING. 

Chapel  lectures  from  time  to  time,  and  a  general  arousing  of 
the  citizens,  made  such  an  impression  that  at  one  time  more 
than  twenty  teams  were  at  work  plowing,  scraping,  and  bring- 
ing gravel  for  walks,  where  many  more  hands  put  the  material 


COLLEGE    CHARTER    AND    GROUNDS.  65 

in  shape.      The  campus  being  so  large,  only  a  small   portion  of 
it  could  be  thoroughly  prepared  and  planted  each  year. 

In  the  grove  where  the  new  buildings  were  placed  in  1846 
the  small  trees  and  shrubs  had  been  removed,  leaving  only  the 
larger  elms  and  a  few  other  trees  standing.  These,  lacking  the 
protection  of  the  undergrowth,  soon  died  out,  save  a  few  that 
had  grown  up  in  the  open  space.  In  replanting,  the  effort  was 
made  to  keep  in  harmony  with  nature;  many  flowering  shrubs 
and  trees  were  planted,  but  elms  and  evergreens  being  favorites, 
were  made  to  frH  the  open  spaces,  because  the  soil  and  climate 
of  the  hillside  are  especially  favorable  to  their  growth;  besides 
they  were  needed  as  wind-breaks  to  protect  the  walks  and  roads. 

Mrs.  Ida  ¥.  Kenyon,  so  long  the  teacher  of  German  and 
French,  has  been  a  valuable  assistant  in  the  development  of  this 
work.  For  many  years  the  early  mornings  of  spring  and  sum- 
mer have  found  her  toiling  patiently  among  her  flower  beds, 
where  she  has  cultivated  a  large  variety  of  annuals  and  shrubs 
that  have  been  a  joy  to  us  all. 

Mr.  Allen  once  told  the  ladies  when  the  Aid  Society  was  to 
meet  in  the  hall  that  he  would  pay  them  more  than  they  could 
earn  by  their  sewing  if  they  would  spend  the  afternoon  at  work 
on  the  o-rounds;  he  would  give  them  ten  cents  an  hour  and 
their  tea.  After  this  liberal  offer  more  than  thirty  playfully 
turned  out  with  hoes,  shovels,  pickaxes,  and  rakes,  and,  with 
the  help  of  students,  a  good  deal  of  ground  was  put  in  order 
and  several  flower  beds  made,  but,  more  than  all  else,  an  enthusi- 
asm was  created  for  the  general  beautifying  of  the  campus  that 
continued  through  the  years. 

MUSIC    OF    THE    TREES. 

During  the  summer  of  1893  an  old  student  was  seen  walk- 
ing through  the  grounds.  Later  in  the  day,  while  making  a  call, 
he  remarked:  'Tt  is  now  years  since  I  was  last  on  these  grounds^ 
so  I  have  been  leisurely  strolling  about,  listening,  as  Professor 
Allen  said  I  would,  to  the  music  of  my  tree,  and  to  those  that 
were  planted  at  the  same  time  with  it.      How  well   I  remember 


66  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

the  talk  in  chapel  on  the  morning-  of  Arbor  clay!  The  ground 
had  been  prepared,  the  trees  received,  and  were  in  readiness 
beforehand.  A  general  lecture  was  given  on  the  'Mission  of 
Beauty,'  after  which  the  students  were  notified  that  all  could 
help  who  wished  to,  in  planting  the  trees.  These  ranged  in  price 
from  twenty-five  cents  to  a  dollar,  and  were,  many  of  them, 
paid  for  by  those  who  planted  them.  President  Allen  said, 
'You  are  planting  for  the  future,  and  when  in  after  years  you 
return,  these  trees  will  sing  to  you,  and  the  music  of  your  own 
will  be  sweeter  than  any  other.'"  May  the  students  long- con- 
tinue to  come  back  from  time  to  time  to  enjoy  the  beauty  they 
have  helped  create. 

No  man  better  appreciated  the  value  of  money  or  the  power 
of  the  useful  arts  to  build  up  for  man's  progress  all  that  invent- 
ors or  philanthropists  can  do.  How  it  feeds  the  hungry,  clothes 
the  naked,  and  makes  it  possible  to  develop  the  higher  sense  of 
beauty!  On  this  subject  we  cannot  do  better  than  to  quote  from 
his  own  words  this  "power  of  the  beautiful": — 

POWER    OF    THE    BEAUTIFUL. 

"Ignoring  this  service  of  the  useful  to  the  higher  ends  of 
being,  utility  all  too  often  compels  the  building  of  home  and 
school  and  church  in  the  cheapest  manner  possible,  innocent  of 
all  finish  or  decoration.  The  angel  of  beauty  plants  flowers, 
shrubbery,  trees,  hard  by  the  door  of  home  or  school,  to  shake 
down  beauty  upon  all  passers-by;  all  over  the  fields,  to  gladden 
the  hearts  of  all  beholders;  all  along  the  old  walls  and  fences,  to 
hide  their  deformity;  all  along  by  the  pleasant  watercourses,  to 
laugh  when  the  brook  sings;  all  around  houses  and  barns,  to 
cover  their  ugliness;  singing  in  the  sunshine,  laughing  in  the 
storm,  to  console  in  the  hour  of  sadness,  to  distill  beauty  on  daily 
toil,  to  help  educate  childhood,  awakening  a  love  for  purity  and 
peace,  for  the  beautiful,  the  noble,  and  the  gocd.  Utility,  shoul- 
dering his  ax,  goes  forth,  hews  down  the  lithe  and  graceful  elm, 
all  a-tremble  with  beauty,  the  generous  maple,  full  of  all  sweet 
sentiments,  its  branches  a  domestic  circle,  nestling  down  cozily 


COLLEGE    CHARTER    AND    GROUNDS.  67 

by  the  'roof  tree'  of  man,  the  slender,  graceful  poplar,  palpi- 
tating to  every  breeze,  the  singing  pine,  the  noble  oak — hews 
them  all  down,  casts  them  into  the  fire,  and  gives  the  land  to 
grass,  beans,  cabbages,  potatoes,  pumpkins.  The  beauty  to 
such  of  mountain  stream  and  waterfall  is  their  glorious  mill 
privileges.  The  same  spirit  too  frequently  takes  the  young,  who 
are  still  all  a-tremble  with  sentiment,  living,  laughing,  walking, 
talking  poems, — takes  and  cages  them  in  little,  low,  half-made, 
rickety  old  buildings,  where  Time,  with  his  weather-brush  dipped 
in  sunshine  and  shower,  has  been  the  painter,  and,  standing 
where  roads  cross,  if  possible,  and  jutting  far  out  into  the  same, 
without  flower,  shrub,  or  tree,  standing  out  cold,  dismal,  and  for- 
bidding, perhaps  with  backless  benches,  and  crevices  for  wind 
and  storm  to  howl  through,  and  a  place,  withal,  where  sheep  and 
swine  love  to  congregate.  Within  such  places  many  a  dull, 
tedious  school  day,  with  its  long,  juiceless,  nerveless,  mummyized 
lessons,  is  whiled  away,  wherein  the  hungry  soul  of  childhood  is 
far  away,  listening  in  fancy  to  the  merry  chatter  of  the  brook, 
or  the  cuckoo's  monotonous,  dreamy,  soulful  song,  while  the 
'pea  is  putting  on  its  bloom,'  or  snuffing  through  every  cranny 
of  the  old  house  the  scent  of  new-mown  hay,  and  the  odorous 
south  wind,  laden  with  the  bloom  of  field  and  wood,  wasting  their 
sweetness  on  the  wilderness  air.  Thus  taking  lessons  of  flow- 
ers and  showers  and  rainbows  and  butterflies  and  fish  and  bird's 
nests,  they  received  instruction  from  teachers  more  potent  than 
schoolbook — most  proper  and  efficient  teachers  for  apt  and  dili- 
gent pupils. 

"An  ideal  school  is  a  home,  not  indeed  for  supplying  meats 
and  drinks  for  the  bodies  that  perish,  but  a  spirit  home,  where 
hungering  and  thirsting  souls  are  satisfied,  where  dormant  ener- 
gies are  aroused,  stimulated,  inspired  to  noble  life  and  action, 
where  spiritual  growth,  strength,  harmony,  and  beauty  are  the 
results;  in  short,  develop  all  that  is  desirable  to  appear  in  future 
life.  An  ideal  school,  like  home,  is  one  that  is  shut  out  from  the 
bustle  and  strife  of  life, — amid  rural  quietudes,  where  all  its  sur- 
roundings are  pure,  simple,  temperate,  gentle,  congenial,  honest. 


68  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

industrious,  intelligent,  religious, — a  community  wherein  joyous 
childhood,  ardent  youth,  earnest  manhood,  silver-locked  age,  all 
are  inspired  by  a  common  purpose,  upheld  by  honest,  rugged 
toil,  lit  up  by  sincere  affection,  its  quiet  hours  filled  with  glad- 
some pursuits.  These  instruct  the  young  spirit  in  lessons  that 
touch  the  inmost  chords  of  the  heart.  In  future  years  scenes 
and  words  and  deeds,  like  some  old  trail  through  the  wood, 
overgrown  with  brush  and  wild  flowers,  are  revealed  in  their 
dim  outlines,  bringing  back  the  early  lessons  of  the  heart,  when 
apt  and  noble  teachers,  though  humble,  instructed  in  lessons, 
rude  it  may  be,  yet  the  very  reminders  of  which  are  as  sacred 
relics.  To  memory  every  such  year  appears  as  a  continuous 
summer  without  a  gloom,  every  night  a  moon-lit  and  star-eyed 
one,  every  cloud  rainbow  wreathed.  The  innocence  of  child- 
hood bursting  into  the  enthusiasm  of  youth,  as  the  garden  bud- 
ding into  bloom,  is  susceptible,  impressible,  palpitating  with 
gladness,  as  does  a  midsummer  evening,  breathing  joy  as  the 
rose  breathes  sweetness,  jubilant  as  are  the  birds  in  a  morning 
of  spring,  sensitive  to  the  touches  of  joy  or  sorrow,  love  or  hate, 
beauty  or  ugliness,  crushed  by  a  frown,  thrilled  with  delight 
by  a  token  of  affection,  enraptured  by  every  revelation  of 
beauty,  going  out  spontaneously  towards  loveliness  or  nobleness, 
towards  thosir;  tenderly  devoted  to  their  welfare,  ready  to  be 
nurtured  under  the  watchcare  of  gentleness  and  piety.  To 
such  all  of  education  does  not  consist  in  what  is  learned  from 
books.  Nature  is  its  constant,  faithful  teacher,  instructing  in 
truth,  beauty,  law,  and  goodness.  Fields,  woods,  streams,  light, 
darkness,  storm  and  sunshine,  sky  and  clouds,  all  moods,  all 
voices,  are  lessons  joyfully  received,  all  instructing  the  eager 
soul." 


CHAPTER    IX. 

IN    WAR    TIMES. 

HE  Alfred  teachers  and  students  were  no  idle  spectators  of 
the  stirring  events  that  for  years  threatened  the  life  of  our 
republic.  All  sides  of  the  greatquestions  then  agitating  the 
public  mind  were  represented  in  the  school.  Sharp  and  often 
angry  debates  on  these  questions  formed  continually  a  part  of  the 
program  of  not  only  the  gentlemen's  but  frequently  of  the  ladies' 
literary  societies.  Speakers  from  different  parts  of  the  country, 
and  frequent  and  enthusiastic  chapel  lectures,  kept  these  absorb- 
ing questions  before  the  school  and  community.  Naturally  the 
vicinity  of  Alfred,  with  its  New  England  endowment  of  sturdy 
character,  became  radical  in  all  the  burning  political  questions 
of  that  day;  consequently  those  students  who  were  conservative 
on  these  points  received  little  sympathy  in  their  ideas. 

The  call  to  make  Kansas  a  free  State  was  heeded  by  many 
old  Alfred  students  and  alumni.  Some  of  these  early  became 
prominent  men,  not  only  in  her  Legislature,  but  in  important 
business  enterprises.  S.  M.  Thorp  and  Solon  Thatcher  in  the 
Senate,  Dwight  Thatcher  as  State  printer,  A.  F.  Randolph  as 
attorney  general,  L.  J.  Worden  as  State  librarian,  with  other 
names,  might  be  mentioned,  the  years  increasing  the  number  of 
our  students  there,  but  not  lessening  their  influence. 

In  1 86 1  came  the  terrible  ordeal  which  meant  life  or  death 
to  our  country,  before  which  our  young  men  stood  aghast,  though 
they  did  not  shrink  from  personal  responsibility.  A  call  had 
come  for  volunteers  to  save  the  Union.  Companions  walked  the 
streets  with  bated  breath,  and  companies  for  military  drill  were 
speedily  organized.  Praying  circles  met  every  evening,  with 
the  one  theme  at  heart — that  of  the  salvation  of  our  country. 

(69) 


■JO  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

Every  young  man  in  the  senior  class  enlisted,  and  all  were 
accepted  save  one,  who  was  refused  on  account  of  nearsighted- 
ness. These,  with  many  other  students  and  citizens,  went  to 
Elmira  to  enter  the  23d  regiment  of  New  York  Volunteers. 
The  morning  meeting  in  the  chapel  the  day  that  our  boys  were  to 
leave  can  never  be  forgotten  by  any  who  were  present.  It  was 
crowded  to  overflowing  by  citizens  and  students,  so  there  was 
hardly  standing  room.  The  eleven  members  of  the  graduating 
class  werd  called  upon  in  turn  to  state  their  reasons  for  leaving 
their  studies  and  all  peaceful  pursuits,  for  the  turmoil  and  uncer- 
tainty of  war.  Every  heart  was  stirred,  especially  when  two  of 
them  said,  "We  give  our  all — our  lives — and  never  expect  to 
return."  And  so  it  proved,  for  these  two  came  only  in  their 
coffins,  and  that  within  a  year. 

Professor  Darwin  Maxson  went  as  chaplain  of  the  23d  regi- 
ment. In  all  this  movement  Professor  Allen  took  a  prominent 
part  by  encouraging  and  stimulating  the  patriotic  sentiment  of 
the  school,  by  giving  all  the  assistance  in  his  power  to  the  young 
men  who  went  out,  and  by  assuring  their  home  friends  that  if 
all  were  true  to  duty,  an  overruling  Providence  would  certainly 
guide  all  things  for  the  best.  He  himself  was  only  kept  back 
from  going  because  the  trustees  and  Faculty  would  not  spare 
him  from  what  /key  felt  to  be  of  more  importance.  As  soon  as 
the  term's  work  was  over,  he  went  to  Elmira  and  thence  on  to 
Washington  to  look  after  the  interests  of  our  student  soldiers. 
Of  his  observations  and  experiences  at  that  time  he  wrote  as 
follows : — 

WASHINGTONW^ARD. 

"In  harmony  with  the  President's  proclamation,  we  took  seats  at 
12  M.,  July  14,  not  in  Congress,  but  in  the  cars,  Washingtonvvard.  After 
a  few  hours'  ride  amid  the  usual  indications  of  the  patriotism  of  the  day, 
we  found  ourselves  at  Elmira,  a  rendezvous  of  the  New  York  Volunteers. 
It  was,  of  course,  a  gala  day  with  both  soldier  and  citizen.  The  soldier 
was  parading  for  the  citizen,  and  the  citizen  feasting  the  soldier  in  antici- 
pation of  the  departure  on  the  morrow.  The  cha[)lain  of  the  23d  very 
cordially  invited  us  to  participate  in  the  eating  e.\ercises  At  the  close, 
however,  we  were  coolly  informed  that  we  must  pay  for  our  supper  by 


IN    WAR    TIMES. 


71 


taking  the  pulpit  and- speechifying  to  the  citizens  and  soldiers.  We  pro- 
tested, afifinning  that  it  was  in  violation  of  all  the  rites  of  hospitality  as 
handed  down  from  most  ancient  times  to  make  an  invited  guest  pay  for 
his  fare. 

"Friend  R,  being  more  modest  than  myself,  if  possible,  undertook  to 
run  the  guards,  but,  as  he  affirmed,  found  a  blue-coated  saint  confronting 
him,  and  with  cold  glittering  steel  appealing  directly,  steadily,  irresist- 
ibly, to  his  heart.  So  persuasive  was  the  appeal  that  he  yielded  without 
resistance.  We  concluded  ourselves  under  martial  law,  and  in  obedience 
to  his  behests,  talked  of  all  the  big  subjects  we  could  think  of — such  as 
war,  peace,  home,  hearthstones,  union,  liberty,  progress,  sacrifice,  human- 
ity, religion. 

"After  restoring  our  exhausted  energies,  we  started  again  with  other 
friends.  Pleasant  was  the  ride  amid  grain  fields  and  grass  fields,  richly 
burdened  with  the  coming  harvest;  pleasant  the  broad  valley  set  round 
about  with  billowy  hills,  overspread  at  the  time  with  a  mottled  covering 
of  sunshine  and  thunder  shower.  Delightful  the  ride  along  the  trout 
brooks,  up  among  the  great  hills  of  the  Keystone  State,  amid  the  rocks 
from  which  are  dug  the  keys  that  unlock  her  greatness,  out  into  her 
splendid  valleys  and  flourishing  cities, — great  and  prosperous  country  this 
— too  great,  too  glorious,  to  be  destroyed  by  ambitious  or  disappointed 
demagogues. 

"On  passing  the  line  of  freedom,  and  entering  the  outposts  of  slavery, 
the  signs  of  a  free  industry  disappear,  and  the  shabbiness  and  unthrift 
of  unwilling  toil  take  their  place.  Just  at  this  line,  also,  the  work  of  the 
defenders  of  the  republic  begins.  Soldiers  are  posted  all  along  the  line 
of  the  railroad,  to  guard  it  from  the  vandalism  of  the  rebels.  It  takes  a 
very  large  force  to  guard  and  protect  what  conquest  has  won.  This  is 
one  of  the  great  difficulties  of  the  war.  As  we  sped  along  through  the 
semi-wilderness  region,  soldiers'  tents  nestled  thick  and  cozily  in  the 
groves.  The  soldiers  themselves,  peeping  out  from  their  tents,  preparing 
their  morning  meal,"  or  standing  sentinel  along  the  road,  greeted  us  as  we 
passed,  and  evidently  had  not  the  least  objection  to  the  morning  papers 
that  were  tossed  to  them  by  the  passengers.  This  was  soldier  life  in  its 
quiet,  picturesque  aspect;  the  stirring,  the  crimson,  was  to  come  soon. 
Baltimore  was  held  obedient  to  the  law  and  order  by  the  unyielding  grasp 
of  military  power.  Flying  artillery  were  stationed  at  chief  points  in  the 
city,  their  cannon  ranged  so  as  to  sweep  the  principal  streets,  or  at  a 
moment's  notice  to  rush  to  any  place  of  disturbance.  The  whole  aspect 
of  the  city  was  that  of  a  glum,  unwilling  loyalty.  And  thus,  as  Tenny- 
son phrases  it,  with  'soldiers  to  right  of  us,  soldiers  to  left  of  us,  soldiers 


']2  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

in  front,  soldiers  all  about  us,  onward  we  rode,  on  through  dust,  decay, 
and  desolation,  to  Washington,  the  greatest  of  American  humbugs.' 

IN    WASHINGTON. 

"Washington  City  is  one  of  the  first  outgrowths,  and  the  present 
rebellion  has  for  its  motive  power  slavery;  its  guiding  star,  State  rights. 
These  controlled  in  founding  the  national  capital.  Pennsylvania,  in  her 
sovereign  capacity  of  State  rights,  failing,  when  appealed  to,  to  protect 
Congress  from  a  body  of  mutineers  from  the  Continental  army.  Congress 
sought  safety  at  Princeton,  under  the  protection  of  New  Jersey,  and  after- 
ward adjourned  to  Annapolis,  Maryland.  Congress,  thus  a  wandering 
mendicant,  dependent  for  its  leave  to  be  upon  the  good  pleasure  of  State 
sovereignty,  began  to  look  about  itself  for  some  permanent  home  of 
safety.  At  this  point  the  North  and  South  collided ;  and,  at  first,  a  double- 
headed  government  was  resolved  upon,  with  one  head  resting  upon  the 
Delaware,  and  the  other  upon  the  Potomac.  Ultimately,  however, 
through  the  recusancy  of  Northern  members,  a  compromise,  by  a 
majority  of  three,  was  agreed  upon,  by  which  the  Potomac  was  to  be 
honored  with  an  undivided  national  capital. 

"On  entering  Washington,  great  earnestness,  life,  activity,  were  every- 
where apparent.  Two  influences,  two  forces,  controlled,  moved  all — 
military  and  legislative.  Everybody  seemed  to  be  moving  in  one  of  two 
streams — to  the  Capitol  or  to  the  camp.  Everyone  was  talking  about 
law  or  war,  and  all  law-making  was  for  the  war.  Soldiers  flocked  every- 
where-— in  the  streets,  in  Congress,  and  in  the  hotels — especially  the  offi- 
cers. Heavy,  white-topped  army  wagons  perform  their  daily  rounds  of 
relief,  looking,  in  their  long  procession,  like  so  many  white-hooded  sis- 
ters of  charity.  The  tents  of  the  great  army  encircle  the  city,  sitting 
round  in  regimental  groups  to  protect  it  from  traitors  without  and  trai- 
tors within.  .  .  .  Many  an  officer  evidently  is  out  to  the  wars  for  a 
good  time  generally,  with  glory  thrown  in.  As  for  the  case  of  the  sol- 
diers— the  drill,  the  inconvenience  of  camp  life,  is  it  ijot  for  the  common 
soldier?  Let  him  see  to  it.  The  privates  say:  'Behold  our  officers! 
What  care  they  for  us!  Let  us  do  as  it  seemeth  to  us  good!'  Never- 
theless, the  elements  of  a  grand  army  are  here,  needing  but  the  genius  of 
a  great  general  to  develop  them.  The  enthusiasm,  the  patriotism,  of  the 
voluntary  soldiery  is  sublime.  They  are  the  heralds  of  that  patriotism 
to  which  the  North  was  instantaneously  and  almost  miraculously  con- 
verted by  the  fall  of  Sumter.  May  they  soon  be,  likewise,  the  heralds 
of  the  universal  liberty  to  which  the  nations  are  doubtless  very  soon  to 
be  converted." 


IN    WAR    TIMES.  73 


ON    THE    MARCH. 


While  in  Washington  an  order  was  made  from  the  War 
Department  for  an  advance  movement.  Friends  being  allowed 
to  accompany  the  soldiers  to  the  front,  Mr.  Allen,  with  several 
hundred  senators,  congressmen,  and  citizens,  went  forward. 
Marching  with  one  of  the  New  York  regiments,  he  carried  first 
the  knapsack  and  gua  of  one  and  then  of  another  of  the  young 
men,  as  they  gave  out  in  the  rapid  march.  My  last  letter  from 
him  was  from  Centerville,  when  they  were  expecting  that  the 
following  day  would  bring  them  to  the  battle  field.  Here,  he 
often  said,  was  the  first  time  he  ever'realized  that  he  might  be 
growing  old.  A  soldier  called  to  the  young  man  whose  tent  he 
was  sharing,  "Who  is  with  you?"  "Why,  that  old  gentle- 
man that  marched  down  with  us,"  was  the  reply.  He  said  to 
himself,  "That  must  mean  me,  for  my  hair  is  getting  gray." 

The  call  was  made  for  them  to  move  forward.  He  never 
forgot  the  picture  of  those  wooded  slopes  on  that  early  morn- 
ing, over  which  were  moving  thousands  of  our  noblest  and  best, 
with  all  the  paraphernalia  of  war.  The  few  miles  from  Center- 
ville to  Bull  Run  were  quickly  traversed.  Burnsides'  battery 
was  placed  behind  a  clump  of  trees  and  opened  fire.  This, 
being  answered  by  opposing  forces,  was  kept  up  for  many 
hours,  till  every  man  was  driven  from  the  position.  After  the 
firing  had  ceased,  Mr,  Allen  remained  behind  one  of  the  big 
guns  viewing  the  field  of  destruction,  when  suddenly  his  atten- 
tion was  called  to  a  peculiar  whizzing  sound.  Something  said 
to  him,  "That's  for  you!"  He  moved  quickly  aside,  and  at 
that  instant  a  large  shell  passed  directly  in  line  where  he  had 
stood,  and  burst  but  a  few  feet  behind  him. 

About  three  o'clock  there  was  a  general  feeling  that  the  day 
was  won.  He  then  started  for  Centerville,  where  the  ambu- 
lances had  been  taking  the  sick  and  wounded  solJiers,  in  hopes 
that  he  could  assist  in  caring  for  them.  In  a  short  time 
McDowell  and  staff  rode  past;  this  seemed  a  strange  movement 
to  have  the  chief  officer  going  to  the  rear.  In  a  few  moments 
the  wildest  dash  of  cavalry  and  foot  came  rushing  by,  crying, 


74  I'IFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

"The  black  horse  cavalry  is  coming,"  Someone,  braver  than 
the  others,  tried  to  turn  the  tide,  and  ordered  him  to  help,  but 
he  replied,  "I  have  nothing  but  ajackknife."  Blankets,  knap- 
sacks, rifles,  and  everything  that  could  impede  the  flight,  were 
thrown  to  the  winds.  Nearing  Centerville,  Senator  Wade 
stood  in  the  road  gesticulating  wildly,  and  giving  words  of 
cheer,  trying  to  inspire  the  officers  and  men  with  courage.  He 
grabbed  a  soldier's  bridle  to  hold  it,  but  a  quick  saber  stroke 
across  the  wrist  from  the  rider  told  of  the  wild,  frantic  spirit 
that  possessed  the  flying  rabble  on  their  retreat  to  Washington. 

Hon.  W.  W.  Brown  writes: — 

"The  only  time  I  met  President  Allen  at  the  front  during  the  war, 
was  immediately  after  the  first  battle  of  Bull  Run.  Truly  this  was  an 
opportune  time  to  meet  such  a  heroic  soul  as  his.  There  never  was  a 
more  gloomy  day  in  the  historj^  of  the  war,  or  perhaps  of  the  whole 
period  of  our  national  existence. 

"The  great  defeat  came  on  the  2ist  of  July.  All  through  that  fight 
our  regiment — the  23d,  N.  Y. — was  doomed  to  listen  to  the  thunder  of 
the  distant  battle,  but  to  take  no  part  therein.  The  reports  that  came  to 
us  during  the  early  part  of  the  battle  were  favorable,  and  not  until  the 
morning  papers  came  into  camp  did  we  learn  of  the  disaster  and  deep 
humiliation  that  had  overtaken  the  defenders  of  the  Union.  A  few  hours 
later  came  the  evidence  of  defeat  in  the  nature  of  panic  and  general 
demoralization.  The  heroes  of  yesterday  became  the  fleeing  cowards  of 
to-day. 

"  In  that  battle  President  Allen  had  been  an  interested  looker-on  in 
citizen  apparel.  With  the  great  company  who  went  forth  from  the  capi- 
tal to  witness  valor  and  victory,  he  marched  in  the  van,  like  a  trained 
warrior.  All  the  world  knows  how  the  '  Boys  in  Blue'  maintained  the 
honor  of  the  flag  during  all  the  long  hours  of  that  day,  until  Johnson 
came,  and  Patterson  came  not!  Then  followed  rout  and  retreat.  The 
slogan,  'On  to  Richmond,'  of  the  morning,  before  set  of  sun  was  changed 
to  a  '  hustle' for  the  Potomac,  the  Long  Bridge,  and  the 'North  Side.' 
From  the  fated  field  of  disaster  came  to  our  regiment  Professor  Allen, 
cool  and  unperturbed,  as  if  returning  from  an  excursion  with  his  class  in 
geology  in  the  old  days  before  the  war. 

"The  coming  of  Professor  Allen  into  our  camp  was  like  a  ray  of  sun- 
shine, and  a  harbinger  of  hope  in  a  day  of  desolation.  All  others  we 
had  seen  from  the  battle  field  told  only  the  doleful  tale  of  disaster,  and 


IN    WAR    TIMES.  75 

prophesied  of  ultimate  dismemberment  of  the  nation.  'No  army  that 
ever  was  or  ever  will  be  organized  can  drive  the  enemy  from  his 
entrenchments,'  came  from  the  excited  lips  of  every  comer  hurrying 
from  imagined  danger.  Not  so  with  Professor  Allen.  There  was  no 
discouragement  in  his  words,  nor  prophecy  of  ultimate  defeat  in  his 
manner. 

"About  him  gathered  the  first  volunteers  of  Alfred,  and  from  him 
gained  the  inspiration  that  kindles  hope,  and  the  determination  that  is  at 
its  best  in  the  presence  of  calamity.  His  coming  was  a  benediction  to 
us,  and  I  believe  not  only  those  who  had  been  his  pupils,  but  all  other 
soldiers  who  heard  his  determined  words,  and  saw  his  lofty  bearing, 
were  the  better  fitted  for  the  next  day's  work  across  the  Long  Bridge 
and  into  the  enemy's  country. 

"  I  can  remember,  after  the  long  years  that  have  intervened,  few  of 
the  words  that  were  uttered  by  him,  but  I  know  they  were  all  reassur- 
ing, and  we  parted  with  him  in  a  lively  hope  that  one  day  we  should 
stand  beneath  the  old  'Union  sky'  witli  the  blessed  banner  of  freedom 
still  there,  full  high  advanced.  I  never  met  him  after  that  on  the  batde 
field,  but  I  knew  his  blessing  attended  us,  and  that  his  heart-beat  was 
attuned  to  the  music  of  union  and  liberty." 

GOD  WILL  OVERRULE  FOR  GOOD. 

As  corresponding  secretary  of  the  Educational  Society,  in 
his  report  of  1862,  Mr.  Allen  writes: — 

"For  the  second  time  this  society  meets  amid  the  storms  of  war  and 
of  national  peril,  to  consider  questions  of  peace  and  good  will,  learning 
and  religion,  to  give,  it  may  be,  some  slight  impulse  to  those  influences 
that  go  to  make  up  a  Christian  civilization.  Yes,  civil  zvar,  one  of  the 
most  terrible  scourges  with  which  a  people  can  be  afflicted,  has  befallen 
us, — a  scourge  so  terrible  that  even  ancient  Rome,  with  all  of  her  martial 
spirit,  never  granted  triumphs,  thanksgivings,  holidays,  or  garlands,  to 
those  who  conquered  in  it. 

"This  conquest,  however,  is  not  a  fortuitous  event,  bursting  upon  the 
nation  unforeseen  and  without  cause  or  law.  It  is  the  legitimate,  logi- 
ical  result  of  causes  long  operating.  The  social  and  political  atmos- 
phere has  long  been  murky  and  tremulous  with  the  approaching  storm 
that  has  burst  upon  us  with  such  terrific  fury.  Prophet^  of  Liberty,  sol- 
emn-voiced and  earnest-worded,  have  long  warned  us  that  the  great 
struggle,  unless  cut  short  m  righteousnes.s,  must  end  in  blood.  Provi- 
dence, as  revealed  in  unfolding  events,  has  warned  us,  has  beckoned  us 


76  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

away  from  the  danger.  All  history  is  full  of  the  solemn  lesson,  that  all 
great  national  epochs  are  but  the  unfolding  of  previously  implanted 
germs;  and  as  is  the  germ,  so  will  be  the  growth  and  fruitage.     .     .     . 

'•Though  we  may  see  nothing  divine,  no  Christ,  in  war,  though  it  may 
come  as  a  curse,  a  scourge  permitted  rather  than  as  a  blessing  willed, 
yet  our  faith  assures  us  that  God  will  overrule  it,  as  all  evil  is  overruled, 
for  ultimate  good.  Whatever  may  be  our  intentions  as  politicians, 
patriots,  or  Christians,  in  the  terrible  struggle  through  which  this  nation 
is  passing,  we  rest  in  the  confident  assurance  that  God  intends  it  shall 
shake  the  nation  until  the  shackles  are  shaken  from  every  slave. 
Though  the  conversion  that  descended  as  a  miracle  upon  the  higher 
civilization  of  the  North,  on  the  fall  of  Sumter,  was  a  conversion  only 
to  patriotism,  yet  an  awakening  began  therewith,  which  shall  soon  cul- 
minate in  unconditioned,  individual  freedom.  The  strategetic  blunders, 
the  official  incompetency,  the  treason  in  high  places,  the  inefficiency, 
indecision,  and  half  measures,  which  may  have  thus  far  marked  the  con- 
duct of  the  war,  are  all,  doubtless,  aiding  the  solution  of  the  great  prob- 
lem of  emancipation,  are  all  unwilling,  unwitting  servants  of  liberty; 
ever)'  military  defeat  is,  doubtless,  a  victory  for  freedom. 

"Yes,  verily,  it  has  not  been  in  vain  that  the  heroes  of  this  and  other 

days  have  lived,  'around  whose  brows  death   hath  wreathed  the  bloody 

laurel  in  the  glitter  of  victory,'  not  in  vain  that  the  martyrs  of  all  times 

have  left  their  'du.st  as  a  seed,'  sure  to  spring  up  and  bear  fruit  some  day. 

"  '  God  stands  beyond  the  dim  unknown, 

Keeping  ward  and  watch  o'er  his  own.' 

"Above  the  noise  and  confusion  of  all  fraudful  and  treacherous  rebel- 
lions, the  voice  of  the  Divine  Providence  is  sounding  clear  and  calm,  saying 
to  this  people,  '  Go  forward,  march  on'  in  the  van,  henceforward  as  here- 
tofore, of  the  nations.  Though  the  way  may  lie  through  a  Red  Sea  of 
blood,  may  lead  a  long  and  w^eary  march  through  the  wilderness  up  to 
the  promisedland,  yet  the  cloud  and  pillar  shall  go  before,  the  angel  of 
liberty  shall  guide,  and  a  good  Providence  preserve,  and  every  temporary 
defeat  shall  be  an  ultimate  victory  for  humanity,  every  hero  that  falls 
shall  die  for  freedom  and  civilization,  not  only  in  this  land,  but  in  all 
lands,  not  only  for  this  age,  but  for  all  on-coming  ages." 

IT    WAS    FOR    THE    BEST. 

As  Lee's  march  into  Pennsylvania  was  only  a  short  time 
before  the  close  of  our  spring  term  in  '62,  Mr.  Allen  felt  that 
he  could    be  spared    to  go  to   the   front  as  field  nurse.     Miss 


IN    WAR    TIMES.  7/ 

Phebe  Evans  was  at  that  time  going  to  carry  our  supplies  to 
the  Washington  hospitals.  We  had  collected  hundreds  of  dol- 
lars' worth  of  necessaries  for  the  sick  and  wounded  soldiers. 
Among  these  were  more  than  a  bushel  of  dried  blackberries 
and  fifty  gallons  of  blackberry  wine,  as  there  had  been  a  special 
call  for  these  articles.  A  large  trunk  was  also  packed  for  Mr. 
Allen  to  take  to  the  field  hospital.  Before  going,  however,  he 
felt  it  a  duty  to  talk  of  his  plans  to  the  graduating  class  which 
was  under  his  charge.  To  his  great  surprise,  the  young  men 
of  the  class  refused  to  let  him  go;  the  young  women,  on  the 
contrary,  sympathized  with  his  enthusiasm,  and  censured  the 
young  men  for  their  selfishness.  But  they  remained  firm. 
"Any  number  of  good  nurses  could  be  found,"  they  said,  "but 
there  was  but  one  Professor  Allen,  and  his  life  was  worth  too 
much  to  be  sacrificed  in  such  a  manner."  Most  reluctantly  he 
gave  up  the  idea,  but  no  doubt  God  was  in  it.  We  feel  now 
that  it  would  have  cost  him  his  life,  as  it  did  that  of  Professor 
Allen  of  Columbia  College.  Several  of  these  young  men 
themselves  enlisted  as  soon  as  the  term  closed. 

Our  young  men  in  the  23d,  because  of  their  freedom  from 
army  vices,  and  their  mutual  helpfulness  for  one  another,  were 
soon  known  as  the  "Alfred  Boys."  Th<-y  were  also  recognized 
for  their  unflinching  bravery  before  the  enemy  (students  generally 
were).  At  one  time  in  a  severe  struggle  the  Alfred  boys  seemed 
to  have  turned  a  defeat  into  victory,  and  as  their  general  came 
up,  he  ordered  the  entire  corps  to  salute  them,  which  was  done 
with  a  right  good  will.  One  of  them  says  that  during  their 
first  campaign,  as  the  smoke  of  the  batj;le  cleared  away,  he 
looked  down  the  broken  lines,  and,  seeing  the  Alfred  boys 
standing,  said  to  himself,  "They  are  praying  for  us  at  Alfred." 
During  the  whole  time  of  the  war  new  recruits  were  frequently 
going  out  from  our  ranks;  several  of  our  young  men  were  pro- 
moted, and  many  reenlisted  after  the  expiration  of  their  term  of 
service. 


ys  life  of  president  allen. 

"starred  names." 

We  cannot  do  better  in  closing  this  chapter  than  to  quote 
from  Professor  Allen's  own  words  at  that  time  concerning  those 
who  did  not  return: — 

"Year  after  year  adds  to  the 'starred' names  of  our  triennial  cata- 
logue. Hands  clasped  in  youthful  friendship  and  lov^e  are  unclasped 
forever;  youthful  feet,  tired  with  life's  rugged  pathway,  rest;  hearts  pal- 
pitating with  all  the  generous  enthusiasm  of  youth,  beat  nevermore; 
young  lives,  rich  with  the  varied  and  generous  culture  of  the  schools, 
and  redolent  with  the  first  fruitage  of  life's  labors,  with  only  a  prophecy 
of  how  their  lives  would  haveblessed  the  world,  if  they  had  not  been 
thus  early  smitten  down,  are  lost  to  the  world.  Especially  do  these 
reminders  of  life's  uncertainty  and  the  certainty  of  death  become  most 
emphatic  in  such  times  as  these,  when  life  is  poured  out  so  freely  at  the 
behest  of  patriotism.  This  Institution  has  its  representatives,  both  in 
teachers  and  pupils, — yes,  its  children, — engaged  in  nearly  all  cam- 
paigns, languishing  in  hospitals,  mingling  their  blood  with  that  of 
brother  patriots  upon  nearly  all  battle  fields.  We  lament  their  fall,  yet, 
mingled  with  our  sorrow,  is  a  solemn  joy  that  we  can  act,  and  offer  life, 
through  such  noble  representatives,  for  human  brotherhood,  and  law, 
and  government." 


GliAPTER  X. 


UAGATIOM    OUTINGS. 

I  HE  botany  and  geology  classes  were  especially  full  during 
.JL  the  spring  term  of  1858.  The  country  around  Alfred  had 
been  thoroughly  explored,  till  the  various  rocks  and  the 
flora  were  familiar  to  most  of  the  members.  It  was  decided 
that  a  part  of  the  vacation  be  spent  in  camping  out  in  some 
new  locality  under  the  leadership  of  their  teacher.  Mr.  Weston 
Flint  gave  such  a  glowing  account  of  the  opportunities  for  study 
on  the  Alleghany  River  near  the  Indian  Reservation,  and  of 
Rock  City,  that  this  point  was  chosen.  It  seemed  at  first  that 
the  number  of  students  wishing  to  go  was  enough  to  make  a 
small  regiment,  but  the  "lions  in  the  way,"  suggested  and  dis- 
cussed by  parents  and  friends,  soon  sifted  the  number  down  to 
six.  These  were  Elvira  Kenyon,  Elizabeth  Wright,  Susan 
Maxson,  and  Mr.  Flint,  beside  Mr.  Allen  and  myself.  Miss 
Wright,  in  her  volume  of  "Lichen  Tufts,"  has  a  chapter  on  this 
vacation  ramble,  from  which  but  a  few  extracts  can  be  taken : — 

"camping  out." 

"We  were  tired  and  wanted  a  holiday,  so  we  went  off  into  the  woods, 
out  of  the  way  of  finery  and  etiquette  and  conventional  rubbish.  We 
left  the  railroad  at  Great  Valley.  The  woods  and  river  here  are  still  in 
possession  of  the  aboriginal  inhabitants,  the  grave  and  friendly  Senecas. 
They  did  not  take  the  trouble  to  stare  after  us  nor  to  make  impertinent 
inquiries.  It  was  a  glorious  July  day,  blue  and  golden,  with  the  fiery 
languor  of  summer's  noon  quivering  in  the  heated  air  and  only  stirred 
now  and  then  by  a  cool  breeze  winding  up  the  river.  The  old  boatman 
took  our  baggage  and  some  of  us  in  a  skiff  half  a  mile,  and  landed  us  in 
as  beautiful  a  spot  as  we  could  hope  to  find.  We  encamped  on  the  grass 
under  the  foliage  of  young  trees  which  clothed  our  side  of  the  stream. 
We  built  three  driftwood  fires  in  a  triangle,  and  within  the  area  spread 

(79) 


8o  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

our  blankets  in  groups,  and,  with  a  roof  of  sky  and  stars  above,  and  walls 
of  green  tapestry  about  us,  we  lay  down  safe  and  happy,  and  watched  the 
sparks  fly  up  like  showers  of  stars  among  the  leaves,  and  saw  the  smoke 
go  rolling  upwards  like  clouds  going  to  seek  their  kindred  above.  A 
grateful  content,  such  as  comes  to  happy  children,  settled  upon  us  like 
the  dew  upon  the  grass,  and  those  who  did  not  sleep  lay  listening  to  the 
voices  of  the  night.  We  arose  and  ate  our  breakfast  and  chatted  and 
sang  like  the  other  happy  creatures  about  us.  The  fullest  flush  of  the 
summer  flowers  was  over,  but  enough  yet  blossomed  to  reward  research 
and  continually  whet  our  appetites  for  more.  The  seed  growth  of  the 
deep  woods  plants,  too,  was  continually  a  feast  of  discovery  to  most  of 
us." 

This  was  but  one  day's  experience  during  the  short  weeks 
when  work  and  rest,  study  and  play,  were  so  closely  connected 
that  the  days  were  marked  only  by  the  garnered  treasures  that 
came  with  them.  We  explored  Rock  City,  where  piles  of  con- 
glomerate tower  high  above  the  general  surface  and  extend 
over  miles  of  territory.  We  also  visited  some  newly  opened 
coal  beds  in  Pennsylvania,  and  sent  back  several  well-filled  boxes 
of  specimens  by  rail  to  Alfred. 

Another  summer  holiday  we  followed  the  course  of  the 
Genesee  River  from  its  source  to  where  it  empties  into  Lake 
Ontario,  gathering  specimens,  of  course,  as  we  progressed  in 
the  journey. 

TO    THE    WHITE    MOUNTAINS. 

During  the  summer  of  i860  Mr.  Allen  spent  some  time  in 
special  studies  at  Andover  Theological  Seminary.  We  went 
by  steamer  through  Lake  Ontario,  then  down  the  St.  Lawrence, 
through  the  Thousand  Isles,  stopping  at  Montreal;  thence 
onward  over  the  White  Mountains  to  Boston.  We  stopped  for 
two  days  in  the  vicinity  of  Mt.  Washington,  and  spent  a  night 
on  its  summit.  Never  shall  I  forget  that  morning  ride  on 
horseback  up  the  mountain.  We  went  on  from  rocky  point  to 
rocky  point,  till,  leaving  all  vegetation  below,  we  stood  alone 
against  the  sky,  while  below,  as  far  as  the  eye  could  scan,  rolled 
the  great  waves  of   hill  and    dale,   till  they  mingled  with   the 


VACATION    OUTINGS. 


clouds  in  the  distance.  During  the  night  while  I  was  sleeping, 
Mr.  Allen  spent  the  time  out  on  the  great  rocks  in  the  moon- 
light, impressed,  he  said,  with  the  presence  and  power  of  the 
Deity  such  as  he  had  not  known  before,  and  never  expected  to 
experience  again.  He  called  me  to  see  the  morning  sun  as  it 
came  rolling  up  from  the  mists  below,  and  hung,  suspended,  like 
a  great  fire  balloon,  out  to  which  it  seemed  we  might  walk  on  the 
thick  clouds  all  around  us.  The  ride  down  was  quiet  and 
pleasant,  though  it  often  seemed  that  the  next  plunge  of  the 
horses  must  be  out  into  space. 

At  Andover  much  of  the  time  was  spent  in  the    study  of 
elocution. 


LEROY 


One  summer  we  were  invited  by  Leroy  friends  to  bring  our 
working  party  to  their  place.  We  were  glad  to  go,  as  that 
section  is  the  principal  home  of  the  cornifer^s  and  other  fine 
fossils.  The  whole  party  was  entertained  in  the  pleasant  home 
of  our  old-time  friend,  Nicholas  Keeney.  His  son  and  daughter, 
with  others,  joined  daily  in  the  excursions,  they  donating  teams 
to  carry  the  party  to  and  from  the  points  of  investigation,  from 
whence  we  took  each  night  a  load  of  rocks  and  flowers.  Mrs. 
Stanton,  a  former  teacher,  showed  keen  interest  in  the  work, 
selecting  and  giving  us  from  her  fine  cabinet  many  rare  shells 
and  specimens.  Altogether,  nearly  a  ton  of  specimens  was 
shipped  to  Alfred  as  a  result  of  the  visit  It  was  a  delightful 
time  spent  with  friends  in  the  study  of  science. 

These  were  only  a  few  of  the  many  trips  taken  during  the 
long  holidays,  but  enough  has  been  said  to  show  that  even  the 
time  for  resting  was  employed  by  Mr.  Allen  in  working  for  the 
best  interests  of  the  Institution  he  so  much  loved. 


GMAPTER    XI. 


IM    MEMORIAM. 


^  I  0  many  students  scattered  far  and  wide  the  news  of  the 
JL  death  of  Mrs.  Melissa  Ward  Kenyon  came  as  that  of  a 
mother.  This  occurred  June  27,  1863,  and  the  com- 
mencement of  that  year  opened  sadly  with  her  funeral  service. 
During  the  following  years,  though  no  less  active  in  his 
labors  for  the  school,  President  Kenyon  was  gradually  failing 
in  health  and  strength.  His  struggle  against  disease  was  long 
and  heroic,  and,  after  seeking  medical  aid  from  various  sources, 
he  decided  to  spend  a  year  abroad.  Accordingly,  in  October, 
1866,  accompanied  by  his  wife,  Mrs.  Ida  F.  Kenyon,  he  sailed 
for  Europe.  After  spending  the  winter  with  Mrs.  Kenyon's 
friends  in  Prussia,  they  started  together  for  the  Orient,  intending 
to  visit  Egypt  and  Palestine,  but  were  unable  to  go  farther  than 
Geneva,  I;?witzerland,  his  health  causing  them  to  turn  back  and 
start  homeward ;  but  failing  strength  compelled  them  to  pause 
in  London.  From  there  he  wrote:  "I  am  but  a  shadow,  but 
hope  the  shadow  will  last  across  the  ocean,  for  I  shall  so  rejoice 
to  reach  America.  May  the  Lord  bless  you  all."  His  friends 
had  hoped  the  rest  and  change  would  bring  the  needed  strength, 
but  in  this  they  were  doomed  to  disappointment,  for  a  sad  mes- 
sage from  London  told  that  on  the  morning  of  June  27,  1867, 
"he  was  at  rest  till  the  resurrection  morn."  Again  the  Com- 
mencement exercises  were  shrouded  with  the  pall  of  sorrow. 

The  following  extract  is  taken  from  the  memorial  sermon 
on  the  life  of  the  first  president  of  the  University: — 

'■  He  devoutly  believed  that  an  appetite  for  work  was  one  of  the 
noblest  traits,  to  be  sought  after  by  all  men,  and  one  by  which  all  diffi- 
culties could  be  overcome.  No  ten-hour  system  for  him.  No  man  ever 
got  on  and  up  in  the  world  who  worked  only  ten,  if  not  at  the  same  kind 

(82) 


IN    MEMORIAM.  83 

of  work,  at  something.  He  abhorred  from  the  very  depths  of  his  soul 
all  dawdlers,  all  shiftless  'Jack  at  all  trades'  and  good  at  none,  all  seekers 
after  the  easy  and  shady  places,  all  who  could  lean  long  on  hoe-handles 
or  fences  without  getting  tired,  all  bottomers  of  chairs  and  headers  of 
nail  kegs  about  stores,  groceries,  and  taverns.  He  enthused  his  students, 
more  or  less,  with  the  same  spirit.  He  impressed  upon  them  the  impor- 
tance, the  glory  of  work.  He  made  them  feel  that  they  were  in  this 
world  for  the  express  purpose  of  doing  something,  and  that  they  were  in 
school  expressly  to  get  a  good  ready  to  do  this  something. 

"One  of  those  slender,  compact,  nervous  men,  with  a  regal  dome  of 
skull,  filled  and  dripping  with  brains  as  the  overflowing  honeycomb 
drips  with  honey,  surcharged  with  mental  magnetism  and  spiritual  elec- 
tricity, a  man  very  earnest,  very  incisive,  somewhat  radical,  yet  very 
genuine,  he  stirred  many  a  young  life  to  the  core,  dispelling  through  his 
fiery  energy,  drowsiness,  stupidity,  and  quickening  them  into  vitality, 
awakened  their  dormant  powers,  kindling  their  latent  energies  into  fervor 
and  aspiration,  and  spurring  on  to  high  endeavor  and  noble  achievement. 
It  took  no  ordinary  rein  and  curb  to  hold  such  a  fiery  nature  in  check. 
To  him  life  was  a  fiery  battle,  and  his  voice  ever  rang  out  to  the  young 
as  the  battle  shout  of  a  leader  tried  and  true.  Ever  riding  earnestly, 
even  furiously  ahead,  amid  flame  and  smoke,  he  had  words  of  cheer  to 
those  who  could  spur  up  to  his  side  or  press  hard  after,  but  woe  to  the 
laggard  or  the  coward.  If  he  descended  like  a  thunderbolt  upon  the 
stupid  or  the  lazy,  the  frivolous  or  the  rowdy,  if  gloved  hands  and 
anointed  locks,  those  symbols  of  affectation  and  foppery,  found  no  favor 
in  his  eyes,  if  schoolgirl  prim  and  simper  and  frippery,  those  signs  of 
shallow  mothers  and  silly  daughters,  were  an  abomination  to  him,  yet 
the  earnest  seeker  after  knowledge,  the  hard  worker,  and  the  needy, 
found  in  him  the  gentleness  of  the  dews  of  Hermon,  the  sacrifice  and 
help  of  a  father.  Did  ever  a  needy  student  go  to  him  for  aid  and  not 
get  it,  if  it  was  in  his  power  to  assist? — Nay,  times  many  has  the  help 
been  freely,  generously  offered  without  the  asking,  as  many  a  one  from 
a  full  heart  has  testified.  In  short,  in  most  of  the  essential  attributes,  his 
was  one  of  the  truest  and  noblest  of  natures,  ever  full  to  overflowing  with 
generous  impulses  and  sacrificial  deeds.  He  was  a  man  whose  life  was 
constantly  overleaping  the  prudential  virtues,  and  taking  on  the  heroic 
and  Christian  ones  of  self-abnegation,  with  entire  consecration  to  a  defi- 
nite and  high  purpose,  achieving  through  self-sacrificing  endeavor.  In 
teaching,  he  found  his  true  calling,  for  teachers,  no  less  than  poets,  are 
born,  not  made.  Aptness  to  teach  is  an  inborn  gift,  not  a  manufactured 
article. 


84  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

"Alfred  Academy,  growing  into  the  University,  was  his  only  child,  and 
no  parent  ever  watched  more  sleeplessly,  or  toiled  more  unremittingly,  or 
prayed  more  earnestly,  for  a  child  than  he  for  it.  Was  it  in  want?  The 
bread  of  carefulness  was  kept  from  his  own  mouth  that  it  might  be  fed. 
Was  it  sick?  With  fingers  upon  its  pulse,  he  watched  through  the  long 
weary  hours  its  every  symptom.  Was  its  fair  fame  assailed?  He  came 
to  its  rescue  with  all  the  intense  earnestness  of  an  outraged  father.  In 
all  hours  of  misfortune,  of  doubt  and  despondency,  he  had  faith  that 
amounted  to  assurance,  and,  rising  above  the  ashes  of  frustrated  or 
blighted  prospects,  he  used  all  failures  as  stepping-stones  to  higher  effort 
and  nobler  achievement.  Rising  early  from  his  sleepless  couch — seldom, 
for  years,  sleeping  after  three  or  four  in  the  morning,  often  not  after  one 
or  two — his  rush  up  and  down  stairs,  in  early  morning,  was  more  effec- 
tual than  alarm  clock  or  chapel  bell  in  arousing  the  sleepers,  beginning 
thus  the  toils  of  an  anxious  day,  closing  his  wearisome  labors  late  at 
night,  to  gain  only  small  relief  through  brief,  intermittent  sleep. 

"The  public,  soon  or  late,  crown  with  honor  those  who  sacrifice  for 
other's  sake.  There  is  virtue  in  duly  caring  for  the  body,  but  the  higher 
sympathies  and  admiration  of  the  world  go  with  him  who  subjects  all  life 
forces — even  making  them  give  way  to  the  ends  of  public  good.  Fru- 
gality is  a  virtue,  but  humanity  is  kindled  into  enthusiasm  in  beholding 
the  sacrifices  and  sharing  the  benefits  of  a  generous  nature.  There  is 
virtue  in  discreetness  and  prudent  reserve,  but  the  man  of  noble,  intense, 
generous  impulse  is  the  one  to  whom  the  hearts  of  men,  and  most  espe- 
cially of  youth,  open  most  readily.  Such  an  one  stirs  the  dormant  energies 
of  the  soul  and  quickly  awakens  the  latent  forces  of  youthful  natures. 
Mankind  bows  before  a  positive  character,  one  who,  amid  opposition  and 
ill  will,  if  need  be,  presses  fearlessly  forward,  with  his  eye  fi.xed  on  the 
great  purpose  of  life  set  before  himself 

"Such  was  President  Kenyon.  The  thousands  of  young  men  and 
women  who  came  under  the  influence  of  his  life,  and  were  quickened, 
lifted,  and  strengthened  thereby,  are  more  than  monuments,  more  than 
riches,  more  than  worldly  titles  to  his  memory.  They  are  living  powers, 
awakened  to  a  new  life.  Invigorated,  inspired,  cultured,  in  various 
degrees,  they  have  gone  forth  to  the  world's  work,  pressing  into  the 
various  positions  of  power  and  influence,  moulding  and  directing  thou- 
sands of  other  minds,  insomuch  that,  though  dead,  he  speaks,  and  will 
continue  to  .speak  through  on-coming  ages,  in  a  language  many  voiced. 
He  lives,  and  will  work  on  through  multitudinous  hands  in  diverse  pur- 
suits and  callings." 


IN    MEMORIAM.  ^5 

President  Kenyon  was  buried  in  the  Abney  Park  Cemetery, 
near  London,  but  his  remains  were  afterward  brought  to  this 
country,  and  now  rest  in  the  cemetery  at  Schenectady,  by  the 
side  of  his  first  wife. 

Another  extract  from  President  Allen's  pen  is  here  subjoined, 
as  it  so  beautifully  expresses  the  affection  and  gratitude  of  his 
heart  toward  the  two  who  had  done  most  for  him  in  revealing 
the  way  to  the  best  that  life  could  offer.      It  is  entitled — 

A    PILGRIMAGE. 

"Finding  myself  near  the  burial  place  of  two  whose  memories  are 
sacred  to  me,  in  common  with  thousands  of  other  old  Alfred  students,  I 
sought  it,  as  if  a  shrine.  After  wandering  wide,  questing  for  the  spot,  I 
found  myself  in  front  of  a  monument,  on  which  I  read  at  the  top,  'Abel 
Ward,'  and,  running  my  eye  down  the  shaft,  read,  'Sally  Ward,'  '  Melissa 
B.  Ward,'  wife  of  Rev.  W.  C.  Kenyon,  president  of  Alfred  University,' 
then,  'William  C.  Kenyon,'  and  on  low  scroll  headstones,  at  my  feet,  the 
initials  of  these  names.  I  had  found  the  object  of  my  search,  and  pros- 
trate, in  the  hot,  blistering  sun,  I  wept,  as  it  is  given  to  man  but  seldom 
in  a  lifetime  to  weep,  wept  regretful,  grateful  tears,  while  thronged  mem- 
ories of  years  long  dead.  Those  dead  years  sprang  to  life  again,  and 
talked  with  me.  I  was  a  boy  once  more,  with  intense  longings  for 
knowledge.  Then  came  a  man*  to  Alfred,  full  of  the  goodness  which 
descends  from  on  high.  He  took  me  by  the  hand  and  lifted  me  into 
nobler  living.  He  still  lives  as  a  benediction  of  goodness  to  all  coming 
within  his  influence.  His  successor  came,  full  of  intense  energy  and 
enthusiasm,  with  the  uplifting  inspirations  of  a  life  nobly  consecrated  to 
sacrificial  living.  His  voice  was  the  bugle  call,  his  gesture  the  saber  flash, 
lifting  us  to  our  feet,  and  bidding  us  forward  in  life's  battle.  Then  came 
she  whose  life  destiny  was  to  be  one  with  his.  Together  they  labored 
and  sacrificed,  passed  under  the  cloud  of  adversity  and  sorrow,  he  in  the 
many-handed  service  of  building  an  institution,  without  money,  in  a  new 
country,  she  in  all  service  and  sacrifice  for  the  well-being  of  students, 
nursing  the  sick,  consoling  the  sorrowing,  helping  the  needy.  To  me 
they  were  as  elder  brother  and  sister,  full  of  cheer  in  despondency,  help 
in  need,  care  in  sickness.  What  they  were  to  me  they  were  to  hundreds 
of  others. 

"The  day  was  thus  spent  in  sweet,  sad  memories,  and,  as  the  sun 


■James  R.  Irish. 


86  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

sank  beyond  the  distant  and  beautiful  hills,  I  returned  to  the  city,  but, 
restless  and  agitated,  I  found  myself,  as  night  darkened,  hastening, 
almost  unconsciously,  back  to  the  cemetery.  All  is  hushed  in  the  quie- 
tude of  night.  The  moonlight  lies  calm  on  walk  and  wood  and  water. 
Tombstone  and  monument  stand  forth  as  sheeted  ghosts.  The  hum  of 
insect,  the  murmur  of  water,  the  sounds  from  the  distant  city,  all  tend  to 
subdue  and  inspire  with  chastened  sentiments.  The  hours  of  the  night 
glide  by  as  silent  sentinels,  awakening  spirit  communings,  earnest  ques- 
tionings of  the  here  and  the  hereafter.  The  distant  thunder  of  the  mid- 
night train,  coming  up  from  Albany,  warns  to  hasten  down  and  away. 
Blessed  are  the  memories  of  that  pilgrimage.  Blessed  are  the  memories 
of  those  earnest,  faithful,  sacrificial  teachers." 


CHAPTER  XII 


CHOSEN    PRESIDENT. 


WHILE  President  Kenyon  was  in  Europe,  Professors 
Wm.  A.  Rogers,  E.  P.  Larkin,  Thomas  R.  Williams, 
A.  R.  Wightman,  G.  E.  Tomlinson,  and  Allen  alter- 
nated in  having  general  direction  of  the  college.  After  the 
death  of  President  Kenyon  in  England,  in  1867,  Mr.  Allen  was 
chosen  by  the  trustees  to  permanently  fill  the  position.  This  he 
did  not  accept  till  after  much  careful  consideration,  not  shrinking 
from  the  labors  or  censure  that  such  a  charge  must  bring,  but 
from  doubt  of  his  ability  to  carry  forward  President  Kenyon's 
plans  for  the  growth  of  the  work. 


METHODS  OF  TEACHING. 


Quoting  from  Rev.  B.  C.  Davis:  "His  methods  of  impart- 
ing knowledge  were  unique.  By  a  simple  question  he  could 
explode  a  theory,  however  subtle  in  its  construction  and  prized 
by  its  author,  if  anywhere  it  contained  a  false  premise.  Even 
a  true  theory  was  often  given  up  in  disgust  when  subjected  to 
the  trying  questions  with  which  he  would  test  the  thought  of  its 
propounded 

"In  discussing  a  subject  he  did  not  endeavor  to  give  us  a 
completed  file  of  ready-made  ideas  and  statements,  to  be  stored 
away  upon  the  dusty  shelves  of  memory,  but  he  aimed,  rather, 
to  put  a  thread  into  our  hands,  which,  if  followed  up  by  personal 
thought  and  original  investigation,  would  lead  into  the  labyrinth 
of  science,  and  there  enable  us  to  discover  and  pluck  its  rarest 
and  sweetest  flowers.  It  was  to  develop  the  independent 
thought  and  personal  manhood  of  the  student  that  he  strove, 
and  he  would  spare  no  time  and  pains  to  accomplish  this  result. 

(87) 


88  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

He  impressed  upon  us  that  education  was  not  so  much  a  storing 
of  certain  truths  but  a  power  to  think  and  discover  new  truths 
for  ourselves.  He  sought  to  develop  all  sides  of  the  student, 
the  physical,  the  moral,  and  the  religious,  as  well  as  the  intel- 
lectual. He  strove  to  make  it  the  postulate  of  human  person- 
ality, that  it  should  lead  all  men  to  become  not  only  politically 
free,  but  educated  and  also  religious ;  that  the  discovery  of  man 
to  himself  must  lead  to  the  highest  development  of  himself." 

ELOCUTION. 

In  1852  special  attention  was  directed  to  the  study  of  read- 
ing and  elocution  by  a  Mr.  Hamlin,  from  Boston,  who  went 
through  the  country  forming  classes  in  many  of  the  academies 
and  colleges  for  training  young  men  in  public  speaking.  The 
power  of  the  rostrum  was  then  just  beginning  to  make  itself 
generally  felt  upon  questions  of  political  and  other  interests.  A 
small  class  was  organized  at  Alfred,  Mr.  Allen  himself  being  the 
most  interested  pupil  in  it.  So  much  pains  was  taken  that  year 
in  training  in  this  branch  that  at  the  next  commencement  a 
marked  improvement  was  shown  in  the  speakers.  During  the 
vacations,  lessons  were  taken  of  Monroe,  Russel,  Porter,  Mur- 
dock,  Booth,  and  all  of  the  principal  teachers  in  this  country. 
Young  women  were  given  the  same  opportunities  as  young  men, 
and  during  the  forty  years  that  followed,  elocution  was  one  of 
the  marked  features  of  Alfred  training. 

In  referring  to  this  subject,  President  Allen,  in  his  "His- 
toric Sketch"  of  Alfred  University,  said:  "Such  was  the  feeble 
beginning  of  that  elocutionary  enterprise,  which  has  gradually 
increased  till  it  has  attained  its  present  imposing  proportions. 
As,  in  springtime,  first  there  is  heard  the  caw  of  the  solitary 
crow  along  the  frosty,  barren  sky,  then,  as  soft  airs  begin  to 
blow,  comes  the  mellow-voiced  bluebird,  followed  by  the  cheer- 
ful sparrow,  the  happy  robin,  the  gushing  cat-bird,  the  soulful 
cuckoo,  and  the  rollicking  bobolink,  till  all  shrubs,  and  trees,  and 
vales,  and  hills,  are  vocal,  even  the  deep  blue  heavens  catch  up 
the  joyous  strains  and  flood  the  earth  with  bird  song,  so  these 


ORDINATION.  89 

elocutionary  strains  gathered  volume,  and  variety,  and  richness, 
filling,  at  first,  the  little  schoolrooms,  then  overflowing  into  the 
hilltop  barns  and  out-of-the-way  places,  till  now,  in  these  later 
years,  and  especially  as  these  anniversary  occasions  draw  on, 
not  only  the  chapel,  but  likewise  each  vale  and  wood  and  hill, 
are  voiced,  yea,  flooded,  with  the  great  tidal  wave  of  commence- 
ment eloquence." 

During  the  spring  terms,  often  as  early  as  four  o'clock,  be- 
fore life  was  astir  in  the  valley,  young  men  would  go  to  Pro- 
fessor Larkin's  hill  (a  quarter  of  a  mile  away)  and  practice  their 
orations,  to  gain  clearness  and  volume  of  voice,  while  Mr.  Allen 
would  listen  and  criticise  them  from  our  front  porch. 

Rev.  B.  C.  Davis  says:  "Most  of  us  have,  perhaps,  enjoyed 
him  as  a  teacher  best  in  his  elocution  classes.  Here  we  were 
charmed  by  the  majesty  of  his  bearing,  his  commanding,  pow- 
erful presence,  yet  so  completely  under  the  control  of  that  won- 
derful art.  Our  impressions  of  him  as  an  artist  in  elocution  can 
never  be  forgotten.  Then,  when  at  length  we  were  permitted 
to  enjoy  his  work  in  metaphysics  and  literature,  we  felt  that  we 
had  reached  the  acme  of  our  college  course.  The  president's 
classes  were  the  anticipation  of  the  undergraduate,  the  joy  of 
the  senior." 

ORDINATION. 

Mr.  Allen  was  called  to  ordination  by  the  first  Alfred  church, 
not  so  much  with  a  view^  to  the  work  of  the  ministry  in  the 
usual  sense  of  the  word  as  to  the  work  of  the  theological 
department  of  the  university  of  which  he  was  then  at  the  head. 
Of  this  time  Rev.  L.  A.  Platts  writes:  "He  was  ordained  as  a 
minister  of  the  gospel  at  the  general  conference  at  Milton,  Wis- 
consin, September  9,  1864,  of  which  conference  he  was  the 
president. 

"Professor  Allen  stood  upon  a  temporary  platform  built  be- 
tween the  pulpit  and  the  window;  the  latter  being  removed,  he 
occupied  a  place  very  nearly  in  the  open  window,  so  that  not 
only  all  in  the  house,  which  was  filled  to  its  utmost  capacity,  but 


90  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

many  who  had  gathered  about  the  window  on  the  outside,  could 
both  see  and  hear.  The  examination  covered  the  whole  ground 
of  Christian  doctrine  and  life.  Professor  Allen's  answers  were 
both  concise  and  comprehensive ;  and  more  than  once  when  the 
form  of  the  question  did  not  furnish  the  base  for  the  answer 
which  he  wished  to  give,  he  himself  gave  shape  to  the  question 
by  saying  to  the  questioner,  Tf  that  is  what  you  mean,  I 
answer,  Yes,'  or  'No,'  as  the  case  might  be.  After  the  exami- 
nation, he  preached  a  sermon,  in  which  he  elaborated  more  fully 
some  of  the  doctrines  hurriedly  passed  over  in  the  examination. 
It  was  the  first  service  of  the  kind  I  had  ever  witnessed,  and 
made  a  lasting  impression  on  my  mind,  as  I  was  looking  forward, 
at  no  distant  day,  to  such  an  ordeal  in  my  own  experience." 

SERMONS  AND  LECTURES. 

All  of  his  sermons  and  lectures  for  more  than  fifty  years 
were  most  carefully  prepared  and  studied,  but  were  seldom 
written  out.  He  usually  spoke  from  a  few  notes,  directly  to  the 
people,  as  he  would  teach  a  class.  Not  half  of  his  baccalaureate 
sermons  were  ever  printed,  so  only  a  small  part  of  his  work  in 
that  direction  can  be  given  in  these  pages.  Here  are  some  of 
his  reasons  for  not  allowing  more  of  his  works  to  be  published : 
"Very  little  that  is  written  will  answer  for  all  time.  It  is  the 
duty  of  the  scholar  to  revise  the  thoughts  of  the  past,  adapt 
them  to  the  present,  and  accept  such  new  ones  as  Providence 
and  man  have  evolved.  We  make  all  past  knowledge  the  basis, 
and  not  the  limit,  of  research." 

In  1857  he  consented  to  fill  the  pulpit  of  a  small  church  some 
five  miles  from  our  home.  This  he  continued  to  do  for  three 
years,  until  a  multitude  of  other  duties  caused  him  to  resign. 
It  was  often  said  that  he  there  made  the  word  of  God  full  of 
new  meaning,  even  to  opening  the  understanding  of  the  chil- 
dren to  its  power.  The  congregations,  being  very  small  at  first, 
gradually  increased  till  the  house  was  crowded.  Many  additions 
were  made  to  the  church,  and  a  general  growth  in  spiritual 
things^  was  apparent. 


PRESIDENT    ALLEN  S    CHAPEL    LECTURES,  9I 

His  lectures,  which  were  always  well  illustrated,  embraced  a 
broad  field  of  subjects.  Being  a  complete  master  of  the  subject 
in  hand,  those  who  listened  could  but  be  profoundly  impressed 
with  the  depth  and  power  of  his  utterances.  If  his  theme  was 
geology,  specimens  were  brought  from  the  nearest  stream,  hill- 
side, or  stone  pile,  and  spread  out  before  the  audience,  who 
were  told  of  the  wonders,  before  unknown  to  them,  which  were 
all  about  their  own  homes.  In  the  same  manner  botany  and  other 
sciences  were  explained  and  made  interesting.  Samples  from 
the  cabinet  were  brought  to  illustrate  his  lectures  on  archaeology 
and  coins. 

The  chapel  lectures  took  on  the  same  type;  they  were  always 
what  would  promote  growth  and  was  most  needed.  One  of  the 
students,  Mr.  D.  E.  Willard,  says:  "To  me  the  day  never 
seemed  to  start  right  if  I  did  not  attend  chapel,  and  then  if 
President  Allen  were  not  there  the  start  seemed  only  half  made. 
How  many,  many  times  have  I  watched,  almost  with  bated 
breath,  as  he  rose  from  his  accustomed  chair,  to  give  his  char- 
acteristic signal  of  dismissal,  to  see  if  he  were  not  on  the  point 
of  beginning  to  speak  instead  of  at  once  dismissing  us!" 

Rev.  L.  C.  Rogers  says:  "The  Faculty  of  the  University 
attended  the  chapel  services  in  a  body.  Beginning  with  the 
president,  who  was  first  by  name  and  first  by  office,  the  pro- 
fessors in  turn  led  the  services.  Then  came  addresses;  and 
who  that  heard  the  president's  chapel  talks  can  ever  forget  the 
impressions  made  by  them.^  They  were  so  alive  with  all  the 
excellencies  of  a  graceful  oratory,  sometimes  so  profound,  so 
learned,  sometimes  so  apt,  sometimes  so  witty,  and  sometimes 
so  cutting;  but  when  such  they  left  no  sting  in  the  bosom  of  the 
ingenuous  student." 

PRESIDENT  ALLEn's  CHAPEL  LECTURES. 

Mrs.  C.  E.  Groves  writes : — 

"It  was  my  privilege  to  know  President  Allen  through  a  period  of 
twenty-one  consecutive  terms,  to  meet  him  in  all  the  relations  of  teacher 
and  pupil,  and  president  and  teacher,  to  sit  under  his  instruction  during 


92  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

the  senior  year,  which  in  his  prime  was  a  rare  privilege,  to  Hsten  to  him 
from  the  lecture  platform  and  the  sacred  desk,  to  be  present  on  several 
of  the  great  occasions  which  stirred  President  Allen's  soul  to  its  pro- 
foundest  depths  and  gave  him  almost  the  utterance  of  a  prophet;  but 
now  as  I  look  through  the  years  and  recall  him  in  all  the  various  places 
where  I  knew  him,  I  find  that  the  most  vivid  pictures,  which  my  mem- 
ory holds  of  him  and  the  power  of  his  eloquence  which  has  lost  least 
with  the  lapse  of  time,  are  connected  with  his  morning  'speeches' in 
the  chapel. 

"It  was  the  custom  of  those  years  at  Alfred  that  the  professor  who  led 
morning  devotions  should  address  the  students  for  five,  ten,  or  fifteen 
minutes,  if  he  felt  inclined,  and  the  range  of  thought  in  these  talks  was 
as  varied  as  the  thought  and  research  of  the  different  teachers;  so  one 
discoursed  on  science,  one  on  mathematics,  one  gave  methodical  and 
instructive  talks  on  language,  one  preached  and  drew  noble  lessons  from 
the  sacred  word,  one  gave  us  the  'gold  of  silence,'  but  it  was  reserved 
for  President  Allen  to  strike  the  fine  chords  that  stretch  between  soul 
and  soul,  to  open  before  our  eyes  the  possibilities  of  the  future  that  made 
life  from  that  moment  a  grander,  nobler  boon,  to  lay  upon  our  brows  a 
chrism,  that,  for  many  a  sympathetic,  susceptible  nature,  has  proved  a 
lifelong  consecration,  and  an  aspiration  to  noble  living. 

"The  circumstances  and  incidents  which  called  forth  these  rare 
addresses  were  varied;  sometimes  an  example  of  self-denial  on  the  part 
of  a  struggling  student  had  moved  him;  sometimes  even  a  base  action 
had  led  him  to  reflect  on  the  prostitution  of  privilege,  and  from  dwelling 
on  that  he  would  leap,  in  the  contrast,  to  his  highest  conception  of  a 
grandeur  of  achievement  open  to  young  people,  and  the  solemn  respon- 
sibility of  life  for  all. 

"At  one  time  he  had  been  to  Hornellsville  the  night  before,  to  listen 
to  Anna  Dickenson  (I  think  in  her  powerful  lecture  called  'The  Struggle 
for  Life');  he  had  felt  the  thrill  of  her  magic  eloquence,  and  the  night's 
reflection  upon  her  theme  had  stirred  him  unusually;  there  was  an  inde- 
scribable light  on  his  countenance,  and  the  talk  which  followed  his 
prayer  gave  free  flow  to  his  emotion.  He  spoke  of  the  struggles  Miss 
Dickenson  had  depicted,  the  victory  achieved  through  and  over  them, 
and  then  enlarged  upon  the  possibilities  before  all  who  were  willing  to 
enter  life's  contest  and  compel  its  conquest.  The  words  of  these 
addresses  have  mostly  passed  from  memory;  indeed,  it  was  not  those 
that  we  noticed  at  the  time;  it  was  the  great  soul  reaching  out  through 
the  words  to  our  souls,  and  attuning  them  to  the  chord  struck  in  his 
own.      How  true  the  response  was  in  some  of  these  young  natures  was 


PRESIDENT    ALLEN  S    CHAPEL    LECTURES.  93 

shown  in  the  spell  that  held  the  body  of  students,  that  was  not  altogether 
broken  by  the  sweep  of  the  president's  hand  which  dismissed  us,  but 
held  many  a  one  in  thoughtful  silence  as  we  went  down  the  walks,  and 
shown  in  their  faces  for  hours  afterwards. 

"I  have  heard  some  of  our  American  masters  of  oratory  since,  and 
their  gradual  rise  to  eloquence  is  sublime,  but  for  heights  attained  in  the 
swift  course  of  brief  addresses,  and  for  power  of  appeal  to  his  hearers, 
President  Allen  stands,  in  my  estimation,  rival  of  the  best." 


CHAPTER  XIII. 

STEINHEIM. 

^^^TEINHEIM  with  its  contents  represents  the  spare 
k^^   moments  of  the  years  when   President  Allen's  life 
•^^  was  so  filled  with  care  and  labor  that  it  would  seem 

there  could  not  be  leisure  for  such  an  undertaking. 

"  Where  did  you  get  the  plan  for  your  museum,  the  Stein- 
heim.'*"  was  often  asked  of  President  Allen.  The  answer  always 
was,  "It  grew."  We  both  loved  the  natural  sciences,  and  all 
through  our  earlier  course  of  study  collected  many  specimens, 
especially  in  botany  and  geology.  My  brother,  Matthew  Max- 
son,  who  had  traveled  extensively,  often  added  to  these,  till  we 
had  a  very  fair  working  collection.  As  the  class  in  geology 
passed  from  one  instructor  to  another,  we  gladly  loaned  these 
specimens  for  their  use,  but  as  there  was  no  good  place  for  keep- 
ing  them,  they  were  mutilated  and  scattered,  until  one  lone  rep- 
resentative was  left.  This  was  a  specimen  of  lead  ore,  so  rare 
for  the  beauty  and  perfection  of  its  crystals  that  my  brother  was 
offered  ten  dollars  for  it  at  his  mines  at  Galena,  111.  Happen- 
ing in  the  geology  class  one  day,  what  was  my  astonishment  to 
see  this  pride  of  our  treasures  a  mere  fragment  of  its  former 
self,  and  without  a  single  perfect  crystal,  I  took  it  home,  but 
not  without  a  few  tears  on  the  way.  When  the  geological  stud- 
ies came  under  President  Allen's  charge,  we  went  to  work  vig- 
orously to  make  another  collection.  I  had  charge  of  the  botany, 
and  both  classes  did  a  great  deal  of  field  work.  During  the 
term  of  thirteen  weeks  the  members  of  the  botany  class  would 
often  collect,  analyze,  and  arrange  as  many  as  three  hundred 
specimens.     Students  in  geology  were  quite  as  enthusiastic,  often 

(  94  ) 


STEINHEIM. 


STEINHEIM,  95 

forming  what  was  to  them  a  most  valuable  nucleus  for  long 
continuing  their  studies  in  the  future. 

During  the  long  vacations  many  a  summer  day  was  spent 
with  hammer,  basket,  and  botany  box,  in  creek  beds  and  ravines, 
or  over  the  hills,  for  something  new.  In  a  few  years  the  collec- 
tion represented  many  miles  of  the  adjacent  territory  traveled 
over  in  that  manner,  stretching  out  as  far  as  Buffalo  on  the  west, 
Rochester  on  the  north,  on  the  east  to  the  Atlantic,  and  as  far 
south  as  the  Natural  Bridge  in  Virginia. 

Here  at  Alfred  we  are  especially  favored  for  the  study  of 
geology  and  paleontology.  In  his  description  of  this  section. 
President  Allen  writes:  "This  valley  is  the  southern  limit  of  the 
drift,  so  that  within  three  miles  of  the  University  there  may  be 
found,  in  large  and  small  bowlders,  specimens  of  most  of  the 
rocks  as  far  north  as  Labrador  that  were  hard  enough  to  stand 
the  pressure  of  the  journey.  These  are  given  to  the  students, 
by  nature,  to  be  assisted  and  classified  by  them  for  their  separate 
collections."  The  native  rocks  of  the  Chemung  groups  are  rich 
in  fossils,  and  the  enthusiasm  for  years  was  such  that  men, 
women,  and  children  became  earnest  collectors.  Often  before 
breakfast  some  little  urchin  would  come  to  our  door,  ring  the 
bell,  and,  offering  a  little  basket  of  his  treasures,  say:  "President 
Allen,  do  you  want  these  .-^  I  got  them  for  you."  There  might 
not  be  a  pebble  of  any  value,  but  they  were  accepted  with 
thanks,  for  it  was  the  right  culture  for  those  young  souls,  which 
he  so  desired  to  cultivate.  Strangers  often  brought  samples 
from  a  distance  for  classification,  and  were  disappointed  when 
their  iron  ores  turned  out  shale,  or  their  gold  proved  to  be  only 
iron  pyrites. 

Brothers,  sisters,  and  friends  sent  boxes,  until  the  library  and 
much  of  the  home  was  given  over  to  cabinet  shelves,  cases,  and 
other  arrangements  for  the  accumulating  specimens.  In  our 
Eastern  trips  we  had  secured  some  Atlantic  shells  and  became 
interested  in  conchology.  The  land,  and  fresh  water,  shells  of 
this  and  the  western  regions  were  rapidly  collected. 

About  this  time  Professor   Larkin  was  professedly  engaged 


96  LIFE    OF    rRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

in  Peru,  and,  returning  to  Alfred  once  a  year,  brought  large  num- 
bers of  South  American  shells.  A  distinguished  conchologist 
had  spent  some  time  with  him  on  the  west  coast  of  Chile,  and, 
with  his  usual  enthusiasm  for  a  new  study.  Professor  Larkin 
entered  into  the  spirit  of  the  collector,  spending  every  leisure 
hour  in  the  new  science,  even  dredging  for  the  rarest  shells. 
During  the  vacation  months  he  spent  his  evenings  at  our  house 
with  Mr.  Allen,  classifying  and  arranging,  often  working  till 
after  midnight.  Everyone  in  the  family  became  inspired  with 
the  collector's  spirit;  even  baby  Alfred,  just  beginning  to  walk, 
brought  in  his  share  of  snails.  When  there  were  duplicates, 
they  exchanged  specimens,  and  in  study,  as  everywhere,  were 
mutual  helpers.  Professor  Larkin  left  a  very  choice  and  well- 
arranged  collection,  which  is  now  the  property  of  the  University. 

During  the  summer  vacations  we  sometimes  spent  weeks  in 
traveling  with  horse  and  carriage,  collecting  and  examining  the 
specimens  found  in  perhaps  over  a  hundred  miles  of  territory. 
When  the  load  became  heavy,  it  would  be  boxed  and  sent  home. 
In  this  way  the  collection  kept  on  increasing  till  it  threatened 
to  fill  the  whole  house. 

About  this  time  Mrs.  Ida  F.  Kenyon  arranged  to  build  a 
small  home  just  north  of  ours.  After  the  land  was  surveyed, 
the  design  selected,  and  the  foundation  laid,  the  idea  was  given 
up.  Mr.  Allen  had  long  desired  a  suitable  building  for  his  col- 
lection. This  being  a  convenient  location,  he  bought  it  and 
went  on  with  the  building.  When  completed,  he  found  there 
was  not  sufficient  room  for  advancement,  so,  without  much 
change,  he  built  on  in  front  and  at  the  rear,  nearly  doubling  the 
extent  of  museum  room,  yet  keeping  all  so  in  harmony  that  the 
beauty  of  the  building  was  thereby  enhanced.  The  whole  is  of 
native  rock,  or  that  found  in  the  drift,  within  a  circuit  of  three 
miles.  It  was  Mr.  Allen's  idea  to  have  the  exterior  of  the 
building  an  exponent  of  the  geological  formation  of  this  region, 
and  the  finish  of  the  interior  representative  of  the  native  woods, 
and  also  of  as  many  kinds  as  could  be  gathered  from  other  parts 
of  the  world.      There  are  between  seven  and  eight    thousand 


STEINHEIM.  97 

samples  of  different  rocks  in  the  outside  walls,  and  several  hun- 
dreds of  woods,  including  that  of  fruit  trees  and  shrubs,  worked 
into  the  rooms  of  the  building.  It  was  the  plan  also  to  make 
each  collection  a  typical  one  in  itself. 

ARCH/EOLOGY. 

While  Mr.  Allen  was  in  Wisconsin,  there  was  much  interest 
manifested  by  students  of  history,  in  the  strange  forms  of  burial 
mounds  throughout  the  West.  A  large  number  of.  these  were 
in  the  region  of  Lake  Koshkonong,  where  an  uncle  lived.  In 
company  with  some  cousins  he  explored  several  of  these 
mounds,  finding  pottery,  bones,  axes,  and  other  stone  imple- 
ments; but  the  most  singular  specimen  was  the  remnant  of  a 
large  shell  that  must  have  come  from  the  Gulf  of  Mexico. 
This  we  kept,  it  becoming  the  nucleus  of  the  present  large  col- 
lection in  that  department.  The  interest  thus  created  in  pre- 
historic peoples  and  in  archaeology  generally,  has  increased  with 
the  more  than  fifty  years  of  study  and  collecting.  He  could 
never  hear  of  anything  in  that  line  without  arranging  to  see  and 
study  the  same,  though  many  years  were  sometimes  spent  in 
perfecting  his  plans. 

After  the  death  of  an  experienced  archaeologist  in  the  Sus- 
quehanna Valley,  his  daughters  advertised  their  collection  for 
sale  as  a  whole.  President  Allen,  learning  of  this,  succeeded  in 
purchasing  the  three  most  valuable  articles,  one  of  these  being 
a  bent  stone  tube,  or  bugle,  the  like  of  which  is  unknown.  The 
Smithsonian  took  a  cast  of  this,  as  well  as  others  of  these  rare 
specimens.  This  was  but  one  of  the  many  opportunities  that 
came  to  him  as  a  seeker. 

The  first  stone  peace  pipe  of  the  collection  was  given  by  my 
niece,  Eleanor  Maxson  Stimson,  now  of  Plainfield,  New  Jersey. 
It  was  found  at  Nile,  N.  Y.,  in  the  debris  of  a  well,  at  a  depth 
of  sixteen  feet.  It  is  of  soapstone,  with  the  mouthpiece  fin- 
ished with  lead,  and  something  like  hieroglyphics  on  the  side. 
Since  that  time  it  has  been  observed  that  the  New  York  speci- 
mens, of  which  we  have  many,  increase  in  artistic  finish  the 


90  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

deeper  down  they  are  found  In  the  earth,  showing  that  the 
higher  civiHzation  was  driven  out  by  a  more  warhke  and  bar- 
barous race.  My  brothers,  Matthew  and  Frank  Maxson,  of 
California,  searched  old  caches  and  other  Indian  mounds,  and 
sent  many  rare  things.  George  Maxson,  from  the  South, 
Henry  Ledyard,  from  the  Sandwich  Islands,  and  others  often 
added  to  these.  Professor  Henry  Ward,  of  Rochester,  early 
becoming  interested  in  our  work,  at  once  informed  President 
Allen  when  anything  of  special  interest  came  Into  his  hands, 
thus  giving  him  the  first  choice.  Many  rare  and  valuable  spec- 
imens have  been  obtained  in  this  way. 

NUMISMATICS. 

While  at  Oberlln,  In  185 1,  Mr.  Allen  met  a  returned  mis- 
sionary from  Palestine  and  Asia  Minor  He  was  an  old  man, 
and  had  come  back  to  his  native  land  to  die.  He  had,  among 
other  collections,  a  bag  of  Roman,  Greek,  Arabic,  and  Asiatic 
coins.  Not  having  a  permanent  home,  he  was  weary  of  carry- 
ing them  from  place  to  place,  and,  needing  money,  he  offered  the 
whole  for  a  mere  song.  The  coins  were  taken  mostly  to  aid 
the  man  in  a  financial  way,  and  It  was  years  afterward  before  we 
knew  their  real  value.  We  naturally  supposed  there  must  be 
many  duplicates  among  them.  One  summer  vacation  books 
for  their  study  were  obtained,  and  the  coins  were  carefully  clas- 
sified. Very  few  duplicates  were  found ;  many  were  rare,  and 
some  of  exquisite  workmanship  and  design.  Before  this  time, 
however,  we  had  many  American  and  foreign  coins,  and  each 
year  since  has  added  to  the  collection. 

Dr.  Darius  Ford,  of  Elmira  College,  after  his  trip  around  the 
world,  divided  his  ti'easures  with  his  friend,  among  which  were 
many  coins.  Dr.  .Slayton,  while  spending  a  summer  in  North- 
ern Italy,  secured  and  brought  to  President  Allen  two  very  old 
etruscan  bronze  pieces  that  were  plowed  up  by  a  farmer.  One 
of  these  Is  three  inches  in  diameter.  On  one  side  is  the  double- 
headed  Janus,  and  on  the  reverse,  the  sacred  ram.  The  other 
piece,  though  smaller,  is  of  finer  metal,  having  on  one  face  the 


STEINHEIM.  99 

heavy-bearded  Jupiter,  and  on  the  other  Bacchus  eating  grapes. 
The  Rev.  D.  H.  Davis  and  Mrs.  John  Fryer,  missionaries 
to  China,  have  added  valuable  collections  to  our  Chinese  coins. 
Eugene  Rudiger  and  others  have  supplemented  these  from  time 
to  time  with  coins  from  continental  Europe  and  other  countries. 
President  Allen  felt  a  keen  interest  in  this  part  of  his  work, 
knowing  that  it  offered  a  never-failing  source  of  culture  to  the 
student  of  history  and  of  ancient  art.  His  lectures  on  coins 
impressed  his  listeners  with  the  idea  that  there  was  much  more 
in  them  than  their  mere  face  value  in  money. 

KERAMICS. 

It  was  the  design  to  make  the  department  of  keramics  an 
index  of  the  early  history  of  the  people  of  this  section  of  New 
York.  Although  Steinheim  contains  a  number  of  pieces  of 
pottery  and  china,  some  of  them  being  quite  choice,  but  little  of 
their  history  has  been  obtained  as  yet.  One  large  platter  of 
flowing  blue  was  a  design  for  a  set  of  dishes  for  a  merchant  of 
Springfield,  Massachusetts,  when  that  town  had  but  one  church. 
It  represents  the  town  with  the  village  green  in  front.  There 
were  but  two  sets  of  these  dishes  made,  the  one  for  the  mer- 
chant himself,  the  other  for  his  pastor.  This  piece  belonged  to 
the  latter. 

LAND  AND  FRESH  "WATER  SHELLS. 

Seashells  from  every  part  of  the  world  can  be  found  in  the 
markets  of  almost  any  of  the  large  cities,  but  the  land  and  fresh 
water  shells  must  be  sought  through  years  of  careful  collecting, 
study,  and  exchange.  Every  locality  has  its  special  species,  that 
must  be  assiduously  worked  for.  In  Steinheim  there  are  about 
ten  thousand  specimens  of  these,  including  most  of  the  known 
genera  of  the  Helix,  that  having  been  a  favorite  shell  with  most 
of  the  family.  There  are  only  about  eight  hundred  species  of 
this  genus  known,  and  we  have  over  seven  hundred  of  these 
many  of  which  are  rare.  We  have  also  a  great  variety  of  other 
land  shells,  some  being  of  great  beauty. 


lOO  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

The  great  rivers  of  the  United  States  have  been  called  by 
the  conchologists  of  Europe  "the  happy  hunting  grounds  of 
the  unios  and  onondontas."  Of  these  bivalves  there  are  in 
Steinheim  most  of  the  known  species  from  all  parts  of  the 
United  States,  these  having  cost  much  time  and  money  to  col- 
lect. Once  while  President  Allen  was  gathering  them  in  the 
Mississippi  mud,  he  contracted  a  fever  which  nearly  cost  him  his 
life.  Our  lakes  and  all  the  fresh  waters  are  teeming  with  the 
univalves  and  most  of  the  varieties  of  the  more  delicate  shells, 
in  the  study  of  which  a  conchologist  might  spend  a  long  life. 
Thousands  of  these  are  classified,  the  smaller  ones  being  put  in 
bottles  and  labeled  in  such  a  manner  that  they  can  be  studied 
without  handling. 

OOLOGY. 

This  department  represents  the  eggs  of  most  of  the  native 
birds,  besides  many  foreign  ones.  There  are  also  casts  of  eggs, 
representing  a  number  of  the  extinct  species,  one  of  these, 
the  egg  of  the  Epiornis  Max,  being  equal  to  one  hundred  and 
forty  hens'  eggs.  Dr.  Mark  Sheppard  and  Leon  La  Forge  have 
added  large  numbers  to  these.  All  are  classified  and  arranged 
for  study,  with  as  many  of  the  nests  as  could  be  secured. 

PALEONTOLOGY. 

Our  botanical  specimens,  animals,  minerals,  and  fossils,  num- 
bering many  thousands,  have  been  mostly  given  to  the  museum 
of  the  University,  but  President  Allen,  finding,  nearly  thirty 
years  ago,  that  the  Chemung  group  was  especially  rich  in  dzc- 
tyospongidcea,  a  fossil,  then  almost  new  to  science,  became  inter- 
ested in  collecting  this  rare  but  well-defined  sponge.  Many 
new  species,  representing  those  gathered  from  more  than  one 
hundred  miles  of  territory,  were  found  each  year,  till  over  fifty 
new  varieties  were  in  the  collection. 

During  the  spring,  summer,  and  fall  of  '73,  not  only  the 
large  geological  class  had  become  interested  in  this  new  fossil, 
but  many  of  the  citizens  and  children  were  looking  for  these 


STEINHEIM.  fO] 


checkered  stones,  then  called  the  ^//^/y^^/i4^4''.V  JVIrNA^len  had 
previously  secured  some  choice  spe.dmene  ffpra*.^ifdtH£(in\and 
Bath,  in  Chemung  County,  some  thfpfy'mi'tey  aWayV  F'nSing 
them  in  Bath  nearer  the  surface  than  elsewhere,  he,  with  a  num- 
ber of  friends,  went  to  this  point,  where  they  and  Dr.  Seelover, 
of  that  place,  hired  teams,  plowed,  raked,  and  secured  over  a 
ton  of  this  rock  with  its  unique  fossils.  The  next  winter  Pro- 
fessors Larkin  and  Allen  went  to  work  to  classify  them,  finding 
and  naming  five  new  species.  After  weeks  of  this  study,  they, 
thinking  that  Dr.  Hall,  our  State  geologist,  ought  to  have  the 
credit  of  this  work,  sent  many  of  them  to  him.  Professor 
Prosper  Miller,  of  Friendship,  upon  opening  a  sandstone  quarry, 
also  found  many  new  varieties  of  these  sponges.  After  this, 
Wellsville  and  other  localities  were  developed. 

Alfred  Allen,  beginning  young  in  the  sciences,  proved  a  val- 
uable assistant  to  his  father  in  Steinheim;  so  fortunate  was  he  in 
finding  new  localities  of  this  sponge  that  Dr.  Hall  employed 
him  to  collect  for  the  State  work,  and  named  one  species  in  his 
honor-.  A  few  years  since,  this  entire  collection  was  borrowed 
by  Professor  Hall  to  make  more  perfect  the  State  book  that  is 
to  be  devoted  to  this  order  of  fossils.  Much  money  was  spent 
on  this  collection,  until  we  had  the  most  perfect  representation 
of  this  fossil  that  could  be  secured.     It  is  unique  and  invaluable. 

MISCELLANY. 

For  want  of  room  most  of  the  insects,  stuffed  birds,  and  all 
of  the  botanical  specimens  that  we  had  collected  were  given  to 
the  Institution  cabinet,  yet  it  would  be  impossible  to  give  even  a 
faint  idea  of  all  that  Steinheim  now  contains.  Things  quaint 
or  rare,  from  near  by  or  distant  places,  were  procured  and  added 
from  time  to  time.  The  crania  of  ancient  and  modern  peoples 
fill  a  niche.  Their  implements  of  use,  worship,  dress,  and  burial 
are  represented  by  many  specimens.  There  are  also  many 
things  used  by  the  early  settlers  of  Alfred  and  vicinity,  the 
study  of  which  will  give  a  good  idea  of  its  history,  and  show 
the  growth  and  progress  of  the  place. 


I02  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

There  are  a  largfe^number  of  primitive  grinding  mills  of 
stone,  bes'des-  numbers.of  drinking  and  cooking  utensils,  made 
of  either  stone  or  clay.  Stone  battle-axes,  spear-heads,  and 
arrow-points,  fill  many  cases  in  the  museum,  and  stone  and  clay 
piece  pipes  fill  some  of  the  niches.  Those  made  of  the  red  clay 
that  is  only  found  near  the  upper  Missouri  River  show  the  far- 
reaching  commercial  relations  of  these  primitive  peoples.  Upon 
one  of  these  is  carved  a  human  head,  the  features  more  nearly 
resembling  those  of  the  old  Aztec  race  than  of  the  red  man  of 
the  present  day. 


\IE\V    l.\    Ul'l'Ek    HALL     srLI\lli:iM 


CHAPTER   XIW. 

FAITHFULNESS  OF  TRUSTEES  AMD  CITIZENS. 

MR.  ALLEN  thoroughly  appreciated  the  faithfulness 
of  the  trustees  of  the  Institution,  who,  through  sun- 
^  shine  or  storm,  were  ever  present  at  their  stated 
meetings,  and  ready  to  help  build  up  the  interests  of  the  school. 
Deacon  B.  F.  Langworthy  was  for  many  years  president  of  the 
Board  of  Trustees.  Being  himself  a  thoroughly  practical  man, 
and  possessing  the  quiet  tact  to  harmanize  varied  opinions,  his 
services  have  been  invaluable.  Elisha  Potter  (called  by  every- 
body "Uncle  Elisha")  was  treasurer  for  more  than  twenty 
years.  He  always  gave,  without  thought  of  recompense,  much 
time  and  hard  work  to  the  best  interests  of  the  Institution 
which  he  had  so  deeply  at  heart.  Often  in  vacations  he  and 
Mr.  Allen  would  burn  the  "midnight  oil"  in  comparing  and 
settling  accounts  and  making  plans  so  that  every  dollar  might 
be  used  to  the  best  advantage. 

Uncle  Maxson  Stillman,  now  over  ninety  years  of  age, 
planned  and  erected  the  first  school  building.  He  has  been  a 
trustee  and  wise  counselor  during  the  entire  life  of  the  school. 
Deacon  George  W.  Allen,  Albert  Smith,  Ira  B,  Crandall,  Wm. 
C.  Burdick,  Almond  E.  Crandall,  S.  D.  Collins,  Samuel  Still- 
man,  Wm.  M.  Saunders,  Silas  Burdick,  Maxson  Green,  Thomas 
Ellis,  Dr.  H.  P.  Saunders,  David  R.  Stillman,  R.  A.  Thomas, 
and  others  living  near  enough  to  attend  the  trustee  meetings, 
never  allowed  themselves  to  be  absent  without  the  gravest 
reasons. 

I  would  like  to  mention  here  the  names  of  many  more  who 
were  just  as  faithful,  but  will  only  say  that  the  community  in 
general  met  nobly  the  demands  made  upon   them.      When  new 

(■03) 


I04  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

buildings  were  needed,  or  debts  must  be  paid,  the  response  of 
the  people  always  came.  Our  community  is  not  wealthy,  yet 
in  1887,  at  a  time  of  special  need,  forty  thousand  dollars  were 
raised  jn  a  few  days,  and  all  within  sound  of  the  chapel  bell. 
It  is  natural  to  overestimate  those  nearest  and  dearest  us,  and 
on  this  account,  no  doubt,  Mr.  Allen  sometimes  overestimated 
this  people,  yet  I  never  can  forget  how  happy  and  proud  he 
always  was  in  referring  to  the  way  in  which  the  great  over- 
hanging debt  was  at  that  time  removed. 

THE    FACULTY. 

The  faculty  has  always  been  composed  of  men  and  women 
of  strong  character,  who  have  given  their  energies  not  only  to 
the  building  up  of  their  own  departments,  but  to  everything 
that  would  help  the  growth  and  prosperity  of  the  University. 

As  the  years  have  come  and  gone,  there  have  been  many 
changes  among  these  teachers.  One  by  one  others  have  come 
in  to  fill  the  vacancies  as  they  have  occurred,  these  new  ones 
entering  into  the  work  with  the  same  spirit  that  characterized 
their  predecessors.  Dr.  Thomas  R.  Williams  and  Professor  E. 
P.  Larkin,  after  many  years  of  earnest,  sacrificial  toil,  were 
called  to  lay  aside  earthly  work  while  at  their  posts  of  duty. 
Mrs.  Ida  F.  Kenyon,  Amelia  Stillman,  Dr.  D.  E.  Maxson, 
Professors  H.  C.  Coon,  A.  B.  Kenyon,  and  E.  M.  Tomlinson, 
and  others,  have  given  the  best  years  of  their  lives  in  con- 
scientious work  for  those  who  came  to  Alfred  seeking  knowl- 
edge. The  reward  of  these  teachers  may  have  been  meager 
as  the  world  counts  money,  but  better  than  gold  or  silver  is 
the  knowledge  that  higher  aims  and  nobler  purposes  have  come 
to  those  for  whom  they  have  labored. 

INDIAN    STUDENTS. 

At  one  time  the  chief  of  the  Seneca  Indians,  himself  a 
Christian,  came  to  us  to  secure  homes  for  some  of  the  girls  of 
his  tribe.  Besides  book  learning,  he  wished  them  to  learn  all 
things  that  would  go  to  make  Christian  homes.      He  said  it  was 


FAITHFULNESS    OF    TRUSTEES    AND    CITIZENS. 


105 


useless  to  educate  the  young  braves  only,  for  since  they  came 
back  to  marry  heathen  wives,  the  future  famiHes  would  be 
scarcely  above  the  old  standard  unless  the  girls  were  also  edu- 
cated. The  mothers  of  this  community  heeded  this  call,  and 
during  the  next  few  years  some  fifteen  of  these  girls  were 
trained  in  all  home  arts,  while  a  part  of  the  time  was  given  to 
school  education.  A  number  of  the  young  Indian  men  were 
also  educated  at  the  same  time.  We  did  not  lose  sight  of  these 
maidens  of  the  forest,  but  afterwards,  when  visiting  them,  we 
found  some  of  them  mothers  in  pleasant  homes,  while  others 
were  engaged  in  teaching  or  in  missionary  work  among  their 
own  people. 

FALSE    IDEAS    OF     STUDENTS*    NEEDS. 

President  Allen  could  not  remember  when  he  did  not  love 
Alfred  and  its  people,  so  when  he  decided  to  make  the  school 
his  life  work,  he  identified  himself  with  all  the  interests  of  the 
community.  The  people  were  a  part  of  his  family,  or,  rather, 
he  was  a  member  of  theirs.  He  labored  to  keep  out  all  bane- 
ful influences,  and  to  build  up  all  that  would  lead  to  advanced 
thought  or  work. 

The  lecture,  "The  College  Community,"  is  placed  in  the 
body  of  the  book,  because  it  will  tell  better  than  any  words  of 
mine  can,  his  appreciation  of  this  people,  his  sensitiveness, 
and  watchful  care  of  them  for  good.  It  not  only  shadows 
forth  his  loving  thought  of  the  workers  who  have  made  Alfred 
all  it  is,  but  it  is  a  warning  against  the  false  notions  that  he  felt 
were  in  danger  of  creeping  into  the  families  of  some  of  the 
younger  members  of  the  place.  The  idea  that  a  student,  in 
order  to  gain  social  advantages,  must  dance,  play  cards,  have 
late  suppers,  or  keep  late  hours,  when  the  brain  needs  rest  for 
its  higher  work,  was,  to  him,  an  extremely  false  idea  of  a  stu- 
dent's needs.  He  strenuously  opposed  any  secret  organization 
whatever  getting  a  foothold  here  to  drag  down  our  young  men, 
as  has  been  the  case  in  many  other  colleges.  The  polish  he 
advocated  was  that  which  should  come  from  within,   from  the 


I06  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

right  understanding  of  ourselves  and  the  relations  we  sustain  to 
humanity — in  other  words,  that  which  should  grow  from  the 
Divine  Spirit  in  manhood  and  womanhood. 

For  many  years  he  was  cheered  by  seeing  that  the  students 
who  most  closely  followed  out  his  ideas  on  this  point  were  those 
who  afterward  took  leading  positions,  not  only  in  their  business 
relations  and  professions,  but  who  stood  high  socially  as  well. 

SUCCESS    OF    GRADUATES. 

Looking  over  the  catalogue,  "grandly  successful"  instead 
of  "failure"  could  be  written  against  the  names  of  the  greater 
number  of  the  graduates.  Long  lists  of  names  might  be  added 
of  those  who  have  been  and  are  successful  in  the  different  pro- 
fessions and  businesses  of  life.  But  not  less  brightly  do  the 
helpful  influences  gained  at  Alfred  still  shine  in  thousands  of 
quiet  homes  scattered  here  and  there  all  over  our  broad  land. 

FROM    PROFESSOR    PICKETT. 

The  followitig  is  from  Professor  D.  D.  Pickett,  Ph.  D.,  who 
for  twenty  years  was  connected  with  the  Institution  as  student 
and  teacher: — 

"At  Alfred  the  moral  and  religious  influences  were  always  decided 
and  salutary.  Immoral,  irreligious,  and  infidel  sentiments  found  in  the 
school  and  in  the  community  a  place  so  unfavorable  to  their  growth  that 
their  propagation  was  seldom  attempted.  The  Institution  encouraged  its 
pupils  to  form  habits  of  order,  temperance,  industry,  perseverance,  self- 
rehance,  and  honesty.  Its  influence  was  felt,  not  in  the  western  part  of 
New  York  only,  but  in  all  parts,  as  well  as  in  many  other  States,  North  and 
South.  To  this  school  many  others,  in  different  States,  owe  their  origin 
and  success.  Thousands  of  men  and  women  will  say,  with  feelings  of 
gratitude,  that  to  Alfred  they  owe  more  than  to  all  other  schools  and 
influences  combined.  While  to  each  human  being  his  every  hour  is 
invaluable,  there  seems  to  be  in  the  life  of  all  a  pivotal  point.  On  the 
decision  of  this  time  will  his  future  mainly  depend.  Like  a  delicate  vane, 
a  slight  force  is  sufficient  to  turn  him  in  one  direction  or  another. 
This  force  may  be  the  daily  influence  by  which  one  is  surrounded,  a  sin- 
gle lecture  or  sermon,  sometimes  a  word,  seriously  or  jestingly  spoken. 
By  parents  and  teachers  this  is  too  often  forgotten.     At  Alfred   however. 


FAITHFULNESS    OF    TRUSTEES    AND    CITIZENS.  lO/ 

this  seemed  always  to  be  kept  in  mind.  Who  can  estimate  the  good 
thus  done,  tlie  influences  thus  exerted,  by  earnest  and  devoted  teachers, 
upon  hundreds  of  youth,  just  at  the  time  when  most  susceptible  to  good 
or  bad  impressions?  While  a  few  may  disregard  the  instructions 
received,  thousands  bless  the  day  that  they  entered  Alfred,  and  bless,  too, 
those  whose  faithful  labors  and  instructions  they  may,  at  times,  have 
regarded  as  useless  and  perhaps  irksome.  I  can  never  cease  to  be 
grateful  to  Alfred.     May  her  prosperity  increase." 

Better  than  any  words  of  mine  will  Mr.  Allen's  written 
thoughts  tell  the  mental  relationship  that  ought  to  exist  be- 
tween the  college  community  and  the  college  student. 

THE    COLLEGE    COMMUNITY. 

''^Extracts  from  the  baccalaureate  sermon  of  President  J.  Allen,  D.  D.,  LL.D.,  preached 
at  the  college  chapel,  June  24,  1888.] 

The  occupation  of  a  community  gives  tone  and  character  to  it.  All 
legitimate  and  beneficial  callings  are  worthy;  but  among  the  noblest  and 
worthiest  is  the  enterprise  of  perfecting  the  young.  This  is  preeminently 
the  enterprise  of  a  college  community,  and  should  give  tone  and  char- 
acter to  it.  Sir  William  Hamilton  truly  said:  "There  is  nothing  great  in 
this  world  but  man,  and  nothing  great  in  man  but  mind."  A  community, 
then,  that  is  engaged,  directly  or  indirectly,  in  upbuilding  and  perfecting, 
not  simply  stone  walls,  or  houses,  or  shops,  or  aught  else  material,  but 
mind,  to  the  end  of  enlarging  and  enriching  Christian  civilization,  is 
engaged  in  one  of  the  greatest  enterprises  that  the  world  knows,  far 
transcending  in  importance  all  enterprises  having  for  their  end  simple 
physical  well  being.  To  this  high  work  a  college  community  is  specially 
called,  and  should  be  unreservedly  consecrated. 

This  calling  is  emphasized,  made  significant  and  potential,  from  the 
fact  that  it  has  to  do  with  mind  in  its  formative,  plastic  period.  While 
full-grown  trees  hurtle  and  knock  th;ii  gnarled  branches  together  only 
to  break,  the  young  tree  is  easily  bent  and  trained  to  new  modes  of 
growth.  So,  likewise,  is  youth  the  time  to  give  bent  and  training  to 
character.  Left  to  itself,  it  may  run  into  waywardness  and  deformity,  or 
take  on  a  deeper  degradation,  with  more  terrible  consequences.  A  col- 
lege community  is  freighted  with  the  responsibility  of  directing  and  help- 
ing this  growth.  Fast  by  the  way,  the  people  of  such  a  community  stand 
over  against  each  other  on  the  Ebals  or  Gerizims  of  cursings  or  of  bless- 
ings, between  which  .students  must  pass  to  their  possessions.  Standing 
thus  they  produce  impressions,  control  influences,  touch  springs  of  action. 


I08  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

awaken  latent  energies,  mould  characters,  determine  destinies.  To  those 
desirous  of  blessing  the  world,  the  college  community  offers  a  most 
important  and  promising  field  of  usefulness.  If  these  fountains  of  influ- 
ence be  made  and  kept  pure  and  sweet,  then  will  the  outflowing  streams 
impart  life  and  health  and  strength  to  all  peoples.  As  are  college  stu- 
dents, so  will  ultimately  be  the  world,  especially  in  its  higher  reaches  of 
civilization.  Blot  out  the  colleges  of  a  people,  and  one  of  their  chiefest 
and  finest  glories  will  have  disappeared.  They  are  at  once  both  the 
exponent  of  the  present  and  the  assurance  of  future  human  greatness. 
From  the  real  they  prophesy  of  the  possible.  Their  ideal  calling  and 
aim  shine  out  from  every  student  lamp.  The  boisterous  world  does  not 
realize  all  this. 

The  college  community  should  be  surcharged  with  spiritual  mag- 
netism, delicate,  sensitive,  ethereal  currents,  that  thrill  and  quicken  all 
coming  within  its  influence.  It  will  also  be  full  of  the  inspirations  that 
spring  from  the  latent  possibilities  of  youth.  These  awaken  longings, 
aspirations,  to  climb  to  higher  planes  of  attainment,  with  ampler  sweeps 
of  mental  vision,  desires  that  become  purposes  to  live  and  do  nobly.  To 
the  ingenuous  youth,  honestly  desirous  of  making  the  most  possible  of 
himself,  such  a  right  genuine  college  community  is  full  of  attractions, 
inducements,  inspirations.  "The  best  culture,"  as  has  been  well  said,  "is 
one  part  drill  and  nine  parts  inspiration" — inspiration,  not  so  much  to 
know  something  new  as  to  become  something  better.  For  this  end  the 
best  and  highest  type  of  schools  does  not  necessarily  imply  costly 
appointments.  The  chief  value  of  school  life  lies,  not  simply  in  the 
knowledge  acquired,  in  the  accuracy  of  the  scholarship  attained,  but  in 
the  inspiration  received,  the  mental  balance  and  spiritual  courage  acquired, 
enabling  one  to  stand  squarely  and  bravely  on  both  feet,  with  a  symmet- 
rical and  harmonious  growth  of  all  the  faculties,  begetting  vigor  in  action, 
power  for  achievement,  the  whole  toned  and  warmed  by  kindly  and  gen- 
erous sympathies  and  gentle  amenities.  Such  culture  comes,  in  no  small 
degree,  from  the  peculiar  and  delightful  atmosphere,  associations,  man- 
ners, customs,  and  above  all  the  spirit,  pervading  the  community.  All 
of  these  subtle  influences  of  life,  which  operate  silently,  awakening  no 
antagonisms,  are  of  inestimable  value  in  their  bearing  on  the  formation 
of  taste,  manners,  morals,  character.  Everything,  however  quiet  and 
unobtrusive,  thus  tending,  all  unconsciously  it  may  be,  to  make  the  stu- 
dent better  and  nobler,  is  beyond  price.  Such  influences  tone  down 
idio.syncrasies,  reduce  self-esteem,  disturb  self-complacency,  abate  self- 
assurance,  wear  off  angularities,  weed  out  the  rowdy  and  the  braggart, 


FAITHFULNESS    OF    TRUSTEES    AND    CITIZENS.  IO9 

and  restrain  the  wayward.  Meanness  is  made  despicable.  Manfulness  is 
fostered  and  made  significant.  Self-respect,  self-poise,  and  self-control  are 
nurtured.  Earnest  endeavor  is  induced,  sympathies  enlarged,  the  ameni- 
ties cultivated,  the  appreciation  of  the  importance  of  a  careful,  thorough, 
broad,  many-sided  preparation  for  one's  life  work  is  enhanced.  The 
highest  end  of  education  is,  therefore,  not  to  make  scholars,  simply,  nor 
skilled  workmen,  but,  rather,  to  develop  characters,  strong,  noble,  and 
beautiful. 

The  specialized  work,  therefore,  of  a  college  community  is  culture. 
This,  in  its  completeness,  is  the  awakening  the  living  energies  of  all, 
enabling  them,  severally,  to  grow,  not  simply  by  passive  accretion,  but 
healthily,  symmetrically,  proportionally,  and  in  harmonious  relations  to 
environments,  through  the  normal  activities  of  these  energies.  By  such 
culture  the  intellect  is  not  simply  enlightened,  but  alertness,  grasp,  versa- 
tility, are  secured  as  well,  the  appetities  are  controlled,  the  sensibilities 
refined  and  ennobled,  energy  and  decision  of  will  secured,  thus  perfecting 
the  best  possible  each  individual,  and  giving  preparation  for  continued 
growth,  and  for  all  opportunity,  privilege,  and  responsibility.  To  this 
end  these  processes  need  to  be  transmitted  into  habits.  Man  is  a  being 
of  habits,  resulting  from  early  training.  As  is  his  training,  so  will  be 
these  habits;  as  are  his  habits,  so  will  be  his  character.  They  are  both 
the  embodiment  and  exponent  of  character.  That  is  truly  culture  which 
subjects  the  wayward,  wandering  impulses  and  thoughts  to  orderly  activ- 
ities, which  makes  virtue,  beauty,  nobleness,  goodness  a  second  nature, 
gives  force,  decision,  fortitude,  self-poise,  courage,  efficiency,  awakens  a 
vigilance  that  relaxes  no  effort,  a  skill  that  vitalizes  all  resources,  a  per- 
severance that  never  grows  weary,  a  vigor  that  knows  no  decay,  wherein 
every  right  work,  every  humble  yet  sacred  service,  becomes  a  spon- 
taneity and  a  joy.  In  order  to  produce  these  results,  culture  must  be 
free  from  one-sidedness  and  incompleteness,  giving  totality  of  develop- 
ment. 

In  securing  these  ends,  in  addition  to  the  school  and  the  community, 
nature  lends  valuable  aid.  She  is  a  constant,  faithful,  and  successful 
teacher.  Fields,  woods,  streams,  sky  and  cloud,  calm  and  storm,  night 
and  day,  all  modes  and  moods,  all  seasons,  all  sights,  all  voices,  have 
lessons  eagerly  received  and  appropriated  by  the  youthful  spirit. 

Our  Institution  is  favored,  both  as  to  its  origin  and  to  its  location. 
Occupying  this  aerie  in  the  mountains,  it  possesses  in  its  environments 
many  admirable  natural  advantages.  This  region,  lifted  above  the 
fogs  and  mists  and  damp  airs  of  the  lowlands,  while  not  possessing  the 


IIO  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

grandeur  of  rugged  mountain  heights,  or  that  of  the  wide,  sweeping 
plain,  or  of  the  solemn  ocean,  has  that  style  of  beauty  wherein  the  reg- 
ular uniformity  of  the  graceful  breaks  abruptly  into  the  spirited  diversity 
of  the  picturesque.  It  has  the  conditions  well  fitted  to  give  both  physical 
and  mental  health,  elasticity,  alertness,  and  all  vigorous,  free,  manly  vir- 
tues. The  naturalist  finds  himself  environed  by  a  geology,  paleontology, 
flora,  and  fauna  remarkable  for  their  diversity  and  multiplicity,  furnishing 
a  museum  of  nature's  own  providing,  crowded  with  the  very  best  mate- 
rial, inviting  the  student  to  study  nature  at  first  hand.  The  aesthetic 
sentiments,  likewise,  are  constantly  appealed  to  and  nurtured.  The  angel 
of  beauty,  with  an  eye  to  this,  has  sculptured  these  hills  and  valleys  into 
picturesque  forms,  and  sown  over  them  broadcast  trees,  shrubs,  flowers, 
in  varied  and  rich  profusion,  and  filled  them  with  bird  song.  These  fill 
the  eye  and  ear,  interfusing  the  tedium  of  routine  toil  with  lessons  in 
simple  beauty,  thereby  enhancing  the  joys  of  life,  making  it  purer,  sweeter, 
nobler,  more  worth  living.  In  these  the  art  student  finds  unrivaled 
inducements  to  the  direct  study  of  the  beautiful  in  nature. 

"  Glorious  is  the  world  without,  but  more  glorious  is  the  world 
within."  While  thus  spontaneously  going  to  the  outward  world  and 
receiving  unconscious  tuition  therefrom,  or,  with  set  purpose,  studying 
nature,  yet  the  student's  chief  study  is  within  the  realm  of  mind.  Neither 
the  one  nor  the  other  is  complete  of  itself;  neither  is  to  extrude  the  other. 
Both  are  to  be  conjoined  and  commingled.  This  alone  gives  complete 
culture.  Thereby  the  student  dwells  in  the  light  of  perpetual  truth  and 
beauty,  in  an  atmosphere  of  constant  inspiration  to  nobleness  and  good- 
ness. Both  from  nature  and  from  within  his  own  spirit  he  hears  a  voice 
of  "  gentle  stillness."  He  sees  the  glories  of  the  divine  robes,  as  they  trail 
through  the  universe.  From  his  books  the  august  excellencies  of  the 
antique  world  and  the  inspiring  excellencies  of  the  modern  world  are 
ever  shining  about  him.  Through  these  the  most  splendidly  gifted 
intellects  of  all  time  sit  around  his  study  table  and  hold  converse  with 
him.  Thus  the  most  vigorous,  subtle,  and  lofty  thinkers  of  all  the  ages 
gather  about  him  and  impart  their  own  strong-pulsing  life,  enthrone  in 
serene  preeminence  enlightened  reason,  connected  with  the  tenderest 
sympathies  and  the  profoundest  reverence.  He  is  thus  heir  of  all  the 
ages.     The  walls  of  his  study  expand  till  they  inclose  the  universe. 

Students  are  especially  quickened  by  the  living  personalities  with 
whom  they  mingle.  As  they  meet  in  the  varied,  bright,  beautiful,  and 
inspiring  relations  of  school  life,  with  common  purpose  and  aspirations, 
they  enthuse  to  all  that  is  strongest  and  best  in  each.     These  frequently 


FAITHFULNESS    OF    TRUSTEES    AND    CITIZENS.  Ill 

have  a  profounder  effect  upon  the  quality  and  compass  of  their  educa- 
tion than  do  set  lessons  and  appointed  teachers.  Not  a  few  can  trace 
their  success  or  failure  as  students,  not  to  their  regular  school  work,  but 
to  their  associates. 

Thus  environed  by  rural  life,  within  eye  and  ear  shot  of  the  refining 
and  elevating  influences  of  nature,  amid  a  community  cultured,  high- 
toned,  and  sympathetic,  and  lighted  by  the  undying  lamp  of  thought, 
passed  on  from  age  to  age,  with  constantly  increasing  brilliancy  and 
power,  student  life  is  rendered  the  most  favorable  possible  for  getting 
growth  of  intellect,  strength  of  will,  delicacy  of  sentiment,  and  all  the 
fairer  blossoms  of  the  spirit.  Such  school  life,  blending  the  old  and  new, 
nature  and  life,  makes  the  culture  of  each  to-day  the  means  whereby 
each  to-morrow  shall  give  a  truer,  nobler  life.  In  such  a  community, 
with  its  strain  of  unworldly  purity  and  beauty,  kept  fresh  and  dewy  amid 
the  dusty  drudgery  of  the  common,  all  are  englobed  in  a  society  that  is 
constantly  perfecting  itself  through  a  free  play  of  the  best  thoughts,  the 
finest  sentiments,  and  gentle  amenities,  thereby  multiplying  all  those 
things  that  lend  worth  and  dignity  to  life. 

Above  and  beyond  all  else,  a  genuine  religious  life  and  culture 
should  be  dominant  in  a  college  community.  As  all  systems  have  a 
unifying  principle,  as  all  beings  rise  in  gradations  to  the  highest,  so  all 
lower  modes  and  ends  spontaneously  rise  towards  the  religious.  Piety, 
the  blending  of  filial  love  and  trust  and  loyal  obedience,  raises  individuals 
and  communities  from  the  plane  of  the  simply  moral  to  the  religious. 
This  is  the  highest  inspiration  in  all  culture,  the  source  of  all  spiritual 
graces,  the  basis  of  all  lofty  character.  It  should,  therefore,  guide,  con- 
trol, and  in.spire  in  all  educational  processes,  as  in  all  other  activities.  No 
education  is  any  guaranty  of  nobleness  until  this  higher  light  floods  the 
soul,  and  there  come  a  vision  and  a  power  that  give  victory  over  all  the 
discords  of  life,  and  the  transcendant  realities  of  the  unseen  become 
dominant  over  the  seen.  Thus,  all  training,  all  preparation,  is  not  simply 
for  the  good  of  the  individual,  not  to  enable  one  to  live  in  the  conscious 
struggle  for  personal  well-being,  not  simply  to  work  out  one's  individu- 
ality, but  through  the  forgetting  of  these,  in  seeking  larger  good  of  all, 
to  the  end  of  making  the  will  and  kingdom  of  God  prevail  on  the  earth — 
this  is  the  highest  and  the  best.  Loyalty  to  truth  and  law,  inspired  by 
reverence  for  the  author  of  this  truth  and  law,  is  the  source  and  spring  to 
all  right  living  and  noble  work.  In  proportion  as  individuals,  communi- 
ties, peoples,  embody  truth,  become  enlightened,  follow  the  lead  of  law 
in  loyal  and  glad  obedience,  will  they  become  strong  and  great  in  their 
work,  get  influence,  power,  leadership. 


I  I  2  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

The  mission  of  a  college  community  is  thus  especially  to  develop  all 
excellencies,  and  silently,  yet  surely,  through  those  going  out  thence, 
infusing  humanity  with  a  finer  and  nobler  spirit,  becoming  thereby  evan- 
gels and  teachers  everywhere  and  at  all  times.  Its  mission  is  to  empower 
and  send  forth  workers  of  all  kinds.  The  students  of  to-day  are  soon  to 
become  the  leaders  of  society,  the  directors  of  affairs.  Many  of  them  are 
destined  to  occupy  high  and  commanding  positions  of  influence  and  use- 
fulness. They  will  have  more  to  do  in  shaping  the  great  interests  of 
humanity  than  any  other  equal  number,  and,  perhaps,  more  than  all  that 
are  not  being  thus  educated.  The  activities  and  progress  of  the  present 
require  for  these  the  broadest,  highest,  many-eyed,  many-handed  culture. 
They  will  have  to  meet  errors  far  reaching  and  subtle,  false  theories, 
philosophies  and  traditions,  both  new  and  those  grown  gray  in  the  respect 
of  the  multitude.  They  will  likewise  be  expected  to  lead  in  all  pro- 
gressive movements,  to  be  heralds  of  a  fairer  and  brighter  dawn,  the 
inaugurators  of  new  and  better  things.  In  order  to  fitly  and  successfully 
fill  these  fields  of  future  usefulness,  they  must  needs  submit  to  stern  and 
long-continued  discipline,  take  to  themselves  the  invigorating  influences 
of  all  generous  training,  manifold  and  comprehensive. 

The  hope  of  the  world  being  thus  so  largely  centered  in  the  youth 
being  so  educated,  this  community,  in  common  with  all  other  college 
communities,  is  a  center  for  originating  influences  whose  encircling, 
expanding  waves  beat  out  to  all  shores,  whose  fountains  send  streams 
down  all  the  channels  of  time,  with  an  ever-increasing  force  and  volume. 
The  importance  of  its  work  rivals,  if  not  outrivals,  all  other  enterprises, 
for  it  is  a  feeder  to  them  all.  The  training  of  youth,  in  the  light  of  these 
high  ideals  and  for  these  great  ends,  is  our  special  mission.  To  this  have 
we  been  called  and  set  apart,  as  indicated  in  the  guidance  and  support  of 
an  approving  providence. 


f,^     ifmm^j.  1^%}- 


P|r--w^?    s^- 

-« 

i*l 

/■     1 

|. 

/■ 

* 

•^ •^^ 

,              •■■^'^ 

CHAPTER  XW- 

WOMAM'S    SHARE    IN     EDUGATIOM. 

ALFRED,  with  its  liberal  policy,  broad  scope  of  training, 
and  co-education,  has  sent  out  many  strong,  thoughtful, 
^^^»)  earnest  women.  These,  as  mothers,  teachers,  doc- 
tors, lawyers,  ministers,  missionaries,  etc.,  have  made  the  world 
better  and  their  own  lives  a  success.  In  earliest  manhood  Mr. 
Allen  became  convinced  that  our  heavenly  Father  never  meant 
that  man  alone  should  move  the  civilization  of  the  world  to  its 
highest  point.  He  had  subdued  the  powers  of  nature  till  they 
were  slaves  to  do  his  bidding;  but,  with  war,  intemperance,  and 
their  attendant  evils  still  existing,  man  must  remain  a  partial 
savage  till  the  spiritual  forces  of  woman's  soul  should  equally 
share  with  him  in  the  lifting  of  humanity  up  into  the  higher 
plane  of  moral  and  spiritual  living.  Everywhere,  with  tongue 
and  pen,  he  advocated  the  dignity  of  the  human  soul  and  the 
brotherhood  of  all  men.  How  anxious  he  felt  that  our  young, 
talented  girls  should  put  aside  all  narrow,  selfish  views  of  life, 
and  move  up  to  that  plane!  How  heartily  he  welcomed  every 
woman  in  literature,  on  the  platform,  in  law,  in  the  pulpit,  in 
fact,  everywhere,  when  she  came  forward  to  take  her  rightful 
place  beside  man  for  the  world's  progress!  His  earnest  sym- 
pathy was  with  such  as  Lucretia  Mott,  Mrs.  Staunton,  Susan 
B.  Anthony,  Lucy  Stone,  and  Julia  Ward  Howe.  From  time 
to  time  these  and  others  were  invited  to  Alfred  to  lecture,  thus 
sharing  our  home  and  strengthening  the  influences  that  had 
made  Alfred  a  leader  in  all  the  reformatory  movements  of  the 
day.  Mrs.  Caroline  H.  Dall,  for  her  varied  talents  and  breadth 
of  scholarship,  early  drew  our  attention  to  her  work.      Having 

{■'3) 


114  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

cause  to  consult  her  on  some  point  of  interest  to  our  young 
women,  she  wrote,  "Go  forward,  take  the  first  step,  and  God 
will  show  you  the  next."  I  select  from  his  sketch  in  reference 
to  her  the  following: — 

CAROLINE    H.    DALL. 

"Over  one  field  of  reform  she  has  made  herself  a  sleepless  sentinel, 
that  is,  over  all  that  concerns  the  interests,  duties,  and  rights  of  woman, 
For  years  she  has  suffered  no  author  or  journal  of  any  eminence  to 
slur,  misrepresent,  or  dwarf  the  cause  without  sending  a  word  bullet 
whizzing  in  that  direction.  Of  course  such  fidelity  has  aroused  a  host 
of  antagonists,  for  it  is  a  peculiarity  of  human  nature  not  to  like  to  be 
hit,  and  Mrs.  Dall  has  a  wonderful  talent  for  hitting  that  at  which  she 
aims.  She  has  probably  disturbed  more  self-complacent  conservatism, 
or  the  half  insolence  and  half  laziness  which  assumes  that  title,  than  any 
other  woman  now  living.  Her  first  series  of  lectures  were  sketches  of 
female  character,  but  were  not  published. 

"She  has  probably  discussed  a  greater  variety  of  topics,  and  covered 
a  wider  range  of  subjects,  than  any  other  American  woman,  and  there 
is  certainly  no  other  by  whom  her  learning  can  be  gauged,  who  knows 
so  much  of  philology,  archaeology,  oriental  history  and  languages,  and 
the  results  of  modern  Biblical  criticism. 

"  Mrs.  Dall  truly  holds  the  pen  of  a  ready  writer.  Her  depth  of 
culture  and  versatility  of  talent  make  her  perfect  mistress  of  the  English 
language.  She  never  uses  a  word  that  will  not  strengthen  or  clear  the 
thought  expressed,  and  what  she  utters  is  from  the  need  of  its  being 
said,  whether  in  the  interests  of  learned  research,  or  in  the  instruction 
or  entertainment  of  the  young,  in  matters  relating  to  the  practical 
economies  of  life,  or  in  furtherance  of  the  great  cause  to  which  she  has 
especially  devoted  herself  She  thus  impresses  her  hearers  or  readers 
with  respect,  both  for  her  subject  and  herself  She  realizes  the  sufferings 
of  humanity,  and  also  the  high  possibilities  of  happiness  within  its  reach, 
hence  her  earnest  sympathy  has  been  given  in  words  and  works  to  help 
every  form  of  human  woe.  Mrs.  Dall  has  been  untiring  in  elaborating 
every  subject  to  which  her  attention  has  been  given,  spending  months 
in  working  up  statistics,  and  when  they  were  complete,  using  them  to 
the  best  advantage.  What  would  have  been,  in  the  hands  of  common 
historians,  dry,  prosaic  facts,  became,  by  her  masterly  touch,  the  bold 
outlines  of  a  grand  panorama,  in  which  human  beings  move  and  hearts 
palpitate.     The  most  stui:)id  and  careless  cannot  read  her  pages  without 


WO.MAN  S    SHARE    IN     EDUCATION.  II 5 

becoming  thoughtful,  and  the  thoughtful  are  spontaneously  moved  to 
action. 

"  To-day  her  position  is  in  the  front  ranks  of  those  who  labor  for  the 
elevation  of  woman,  where  she  stands  with  a  serene  confidence  in  the 
onward  march  and  final  triumph  of  grand  ideas  she  has  so  long  and 
unfalteringly  held  up  to  the  public.  Her  work  on  '  Woman's  Rights ' 
has  been  so  exhaustive  in  logic  and  facts  that  it  has  been  a  golden 
fountain,  from  which  most  of  the  later  writers  and  lecturers  have  drawn, 
often  without  so  much  as,  'By  your  leave,  madam.'  Her  labor  has  been 
very  influential  in  opening  the  doors  of  colleges  to  woman. 

"Mrs.  Dall  is  endowed  by  nature  with  an  exquisite  sense  of  order 
and  fitness  that  pervades  her  entire  being  and  governs  all  her  acts,  thus 
making  her  life  the  richest,  grandest  volume  of  all  that  she  has  presented 
to  the  world.  Thousands  working  in  avenues  opened  by  her  earnest 
efforts  will  rise  up  to  call  her  blessed." 

Mrs.  Dall  being  acknowledged  as  one  of  the  finest  female 
scholars  of  our  times  in  law  as  well  as  in  literature,  her  name 
was  proposed  to  our  Faculty  for  the  title  of  LL.D.  This  was 
granted  by  them  in  1878,  she  being  the  first  woman  in  modern 
times  to  receive  that  title.  Miss  Maria  Mitchell  received  hers 
in  1882,  from  the  college  at  Hanover,  Indiana.    , 

The  following  slight  extract  is  from  President  Allen's  sketch 
of  Mrs.  Browning  as  a  poet: — 

ELIZABETH    BARRETT    BROWNING. 

"  From  the  earliest  periods  of  time  down  through  the  succeeding  ages 
there  has  appeared  a  line  of  kings  of  song,  whose  thrones  are  more  per- 
manent than  those  of  earthly  sovereigns.  To  whom  is  our  allegiance  more 
fully  accorded,  or  sworn  fealty  more  fully  kept,  than  to  those  who  have 
touched  into  activity  the  secret  springs  of  sensibility?  What  is  it  that 
in  every  household  makes  the  name  of  King  David  as  familiar  as  that 
of  father  or  mother  ?  Is  it  that  he  was  Israel's  king?  or  that  he  gave  to 
the  world  those  divine  songs  which  have  lived  and  rolled  through  the 
dim  aisles  of  buried  ages,  and  still  remain  in  majesty  and  power,  shed- 
ding their  rays  of  divine  light  upon  the  human  soul?  And  following  in 
the  same  line  is  grand  old  Homer.  Blind  and  beggar  that  he  was,  he 
left  on  record  strains  that  are  yet  echoing  along  the  swift-revolving  cen- 
turies. Thus  they  come — Virgil,  Dante,  Shakespeare.  But  here  in 
these  latter  days  comes  a  zvoinan,  who,  in  the  words  of  her  own  favorite 


Il6  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

Shelle\',  'so  learned  in  suffering  what  she  taught  in  song'  that  the  world 
stands  wondering  by  whose  side  she  shall  be  crowned.  Sister  of  Ten- 
nyson, some  have  said;  others,  daughter  of  Shakespeare,  reluctant  to 
own  the  greatness  of  her  power,  yet  knowing  her  throne  is  so  established 
in  the  hearts  of  the  world  that  it  cannot  be  overthrown.  But  while  these 
critiques  are  talking  and  writing  articles  of  measurement,  we  who  love 
her  for  her  priceless  gifts  can,  with  a  steady  hand,  place  upon  her  head 
the  sacred  crown  of  true  and  complete  poet. 

"Mrs.  Browning's  mind  matured  young.  Being,  through  suffering 
so  many  years,  put  by  from  all  the  active  pleasures  of  life,  learning  seems 
to'  have  been  the  one  gift  within  her  reach,  and  she  grasped  it  with  pas- 
sionate earnestness.  Early  in  life  she  became  an  accomplished  scholar 
in  ancient  literature,  then,  with  her  blind  tutor,  Boid,  she  read  the  Greek 
poets  with  a  love  that  has  left  its  mark  upon  every  page  of  her  writings. 
There  in  that  room  where  she  was  so  many  years  the  prisoner  of  pain, 
with  no  companions  except  a  few  chosen  friends,  her  Hebrew  Bible,  a 
shelf  full  of  Greek  books,  and  several  volumes  of  polyglot  reading,  she 
labored  and  suffered,  gathering  classic  jewels  with  which  to  set  her  own 
thoughts  in  after  years.  Mrs.  Browning's  genius  as  a  poet  is  of  two 
kinds,  lyric  and  4i-amatic.  As  the  rank  of  lyric  poetry  lies  in  the  power 
of  the  poet  to  coin  his  own  soul  in  gems  of  song,  she  stands  firmly  with 
its  leaders.  Her  pen  has  caught  an  impulse  from  every  phase  of  life, — 
romance,  chivalry,  love,  patriotism,  humanity,  divine  life,  and  immor- 
tality, a  noble  collection  that  shall  live  in  the  future,  not  as  empty  gob- 
lets whose  contents  have  been  drained,  but  fountains  that  still  flow  when 
the  traveler  who  drank  from  them  has  passed  on. 

"  It  was  that  sense  of  divine  life  in  her  life  that  has  exalted  her  so 
high  as  a  woman,  that  of  all  the  works  she  has  left  her  own  life  is  the 
sweetest,  noblest  poem  of  them  all.  Looking  tlirough  all  the  years  of 
her  life,  with  the  exception  of  infirm  bodily  health,  which  in  her  case 
seems  to  be  no  hindrance  but  rather  an  aid  to  her  spiritual  growth,  her' 
external  relations  all  present  a  round  of  perfect  harmony  with  her  highest 
gifts.  In  the  benefits  of  early  culture,  in  the  power  of  poetic  thought 
and  expression,  in  the  romance  of  impassioned  love,  and  in  the  full  frui- 
tion of  domestic  joys,  in  that  Italian  home,  with  all  its  appliances  of  art 
and  circle  of  kindred  spirits,  her  earthly  course  lies  closed  at  last,  like 
some  beautiful  da)-  lily  whose  closing  sweetness  yet  lingers  on  the  even- 
ing air." 


WOMAN  S  SHARE  IN  EDUCATION.  II  7 

Mr.  P.  A.  Burdick,  the  noted  temperance  evangelist,  whom 
Alfred  was  proud  to  claim,  said  at  the  service  held  in  memory 
of  President  Allen: — 

"He  was  anions^  the  first  to  believe  in  woman's  equalit)-  with  man. 
He  believed  that  she  had  the  riglit  to  an  education  outside  of  the  old 
established  domestic  lines.  He  believed  that  she  had  the  right  to  think, 
to  act,  to  vote.  He  espoused  these  principles  in  the  face  of  centuries  of 
prejudice.  He  demanded  for  woman  the  right  to  fill  positions  of  trust, 
to  become  lawyers,  doctors,  ministers  of  the  gospel,  and  at  a  time  when 
it  was  but  little  less  than  martyrdom  to  promulgate  such  doctrine.  He 
builded  better  than  he  knew.  His  faith  in  the  possibilities  and  capa- 
bilities of  womanhood  took  root  in  other  lives,  and  he  saw  established 
in  Alfred  University  woman's  equality  with  man." 

Professor  L.  C.  Rogers  at  the  same  service  said: — 

"hi  the  spirit  of  noble  knighthood  he  stood  for  woman's  rights.  He 
was  an  almost  worshipful  admirer  of  true  womanhood.  He  gallantly 
maintained  woman's  equal  privilege  with  man  to  win  in  the  common 
struggle  for  maintenance,  for  place,  and  power.  His  sympathies  were 
always  with  the  cause  of  truth  and  righteousness,  as  he  was  enabled  to 
see  these  issues." 


CHAPTER   XWI 


THE    HOME, 


^^^^^RESIDENT  ALLEN  loved  his  home,  and  was  never 

y^  absent  from  it  longer  than  necessary.     The  burdens 

JL        and  disappointments  that  came  under  most  trying 

circumstances    were    dropped    in    the    home    circle, 

where  his  genial  tenderness  and  patience  were  lessons  to  all. 

Our  habits  of  living  were  so  simple  that  sickness  seldom 
found  its  way  into  the  family.  Through  his  knowledge  of  med- 
icine, the  laws  of  life,  and  careful  nursing,  many  a  sick  student 
was  restored  to  health.  Our  rooms  were  many  times  thrown 
open  to  the  sick,  who  were  cared  for  as  though  they  had  been 
members  of  the  family.  Sometimes  for  weeks  together  he 
would  not  have  a  single  night  of  sleep  on  this  account. 

A  sad  experience  came  in  July,  1879.  While  Mr.  Allen  was 
in  Albany  attending  the  Regents'  Convocation,  he  became  indis- 
posed, and  was  advised  by  physicians  to  return  home.  This 
advice  was  followed,  he  never  dreaming  that  the  trouble  would 
actually  prove  to  be  smallpox.  During  this  illness  of  five  weeks, 
through  the  thoughtful  suggestion  of  Dr.  Sheppard,  we  were 
quarantined  in  Steinheim.  Although  he  recovered  to  all  appear- 
ance from  its  effects,  yet  he  never  afterward  possessed  the  nerv- 
ous vigor  of  former  years. 

At  table,  his  ready  wit  and  quaint  story-telling  were  a  never- 
failing  source  of  enjoyment  and  profit.  The  twilight  hour  often 
found  father  and  children  with  shout  and  laughter  chasing  one 
another  up  and  down  through  the  house.  "We're  making  too 
much  noise  for  mamma,"  was  the  signal  to  return  to  their 
studies.      In  the  development  of  their  varied  talents  he  took  a 

(.18) 


THE    FAMILY. 


THE    HOME.  119 

special  pride,  always  being  careful  to  give  them  freedom  in  the 
choice  of  their  own  lines  of  study  when  old  enough  to  plan  for 
themselves.  The  winter  evenings  were  sometimes  devoted  to 
science — each  child  sharing  in  the  general  study  of  plants,  shells, 
and  rocks. 

Words  of  reproof  were  seldom  heard,  though  no  child  or 
inmate  of  the  family  ever  thought  of  disobeying  father's  com- 
mands. His  love  of  fun  and  keen  sense  of  the  ridiculous  some- 
times made  his  relations  even  with  delinquent  students  pleasant. 
The  study  was  the  gathering  place  for  such  when  the  offense 
was  not  grave  enough  to  come  before  the  Faculty.  These  young 
people,  being  asked  to  give  a  history  of  the  matter,  would  per- 
haps leave  out  some  important  item,  but  from  his  sharp  ques- 
tions they  would  see  how  vain  it  was  to  hide  the  truth,  as  the 
president  seemed  to  know  all  about  the  offense  and  was  com- 
plete master  of  the  situation.  A  paternal  talk  would  follow, 
from  which  many  could  date  their  first  knowledge  of  his  true 
character.  He  was  always  much  surprised  and  affected  when 
letters,  plants,  books,  or  anything  came  as  tokens  from  these 
students. 

In  warm  weather  the  broad  front  porch,  commanding  one  of 
the  finest  views  of  the  grounds  and  surrounding  hills,  was  used 
as  a  receiving  parlor,  where  teachers,  students,  and  friends  often 
gathered  for  social  chats  with  the  family. 

MEMORIES    OF    THE    HOME,    BY    MRS.   LIZZIE    NELSON    FRYER. 

I  had  looked  toward  Alfred  as  the  ideal  home  of  student 
life,  and  first  reached  there  in  the  autumn  of  1869. 

It  was  evening  when  the  stage  drove  up  the  hill  to  President 
Allen's  house — conspicuous  by  the  many  lights  in  the  win- 
dows. Eva,  a  rosy-cheeked  girl,  not  yet  in  long  gowns,  came 
to  the  veranda  to  give  me  welcome.  Her  mother  had  gone 
away  for  a  few  days  to  paint  a  picture  of  a  friend's  home,  she 
said,  and  she  was  left  to  entertain  any  who  might  come.  Her 
easy,  cordial  manner,  while  she  told  about  the  school,  and  the 
different     members    of    her    family,    was     so    reassuring    that 


I20  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

little  time  was  lost  before  we  were  discussing  Longfellow, 
Whittier,  and  Tennyson.  Of  these  poets  I  had  a  schoolbook 
knowledge,  but  when  she  talked  of  other  works,  such  as  "Torn 
Brown's  School  Days,"  and  "Ivanhoe,"  which  she  was  holding 
in  her  hand,  I  could  say  nothing  except  confess  ignorance. 
Scott  was  her  "favorite  author."  Knowing  little  of  him,  and 
other  writers  of  whom  she  spoke.  I  retired  that  night  mortified 
that  a  girl  so  much  younger  than  myself  could  converse  intelli- 
gently upon  subjects  unknown  to  me.  Before  morning,  how- 
ever, a  decided  resolution  was  made  to  know  more  of  literature. 
This  was  my  first  lesson  at  Alfred. 

The  term  had  been  in  session  a  fortnight  or  more,  so  it  was 
not  easy  to  find  a  place  in  the  classes  I  had  planned  to  enter. 
How  vividly  memory  recalls  a  forenoon  spent  in  complete  fail- 
ure in  this  respect!  After  an  early  excuse  from  the  dinner 
table,  I  sank  into  a  chair  in  the  parlor,  to  hide  a  coming  flood  of 
tears.  In  the  midst  of  the  outburst  who  should  quietly  enter 
but  the  president  himself.  "What's  the  trouble.^  Are  you  ill?" 
he  asked  kindly.  "No,  only  discouraged  and  homesick,"  was 
the  hesitating  reply.  "Glad  to  hear  it.  Glad  to  hear  it.'' 
Then  by  subtile  questions  he  gradually  drew  out  my  experience 
in  teaching  and  "boarding  round"  that  summer,  and  upon  leav- 
ing the  room  remarked:  "You'll  do.  Young  ladies  who  ever 
amount  to  anything  always  have  a  cry  when  they  come  to 
Alfred."  Tliese  words  may  have  had  a  tinge  of  sarcasm,  but 
from-  that  hour  I  knew  President  Allen  to  be  the  students' 
friend. 

Before  many  days  the  home  circle  was  made  complete  by 
the  return  of  Mrs.  Allen  and  active,  inquiring  little  May. 
Alfred  was  a  fair-haired,  sturdy  little  fellow  in  dresses — the 
baby  and  pet  of  the  household. 

Those  were  cheerful  times  in  a  happy  home.  At  breakfast 
all  repeated  verses  of  Scripture,  which  were  sometimes  chosen 
from  a  scroll  on  the  wall  of  the  dining  room.  Then  the  father 
followed  with  a  touching,  beautiful  prayer.  Every  week-day 
hour  was  crowded  with  duties  of  one  kind  or  another,  until  in 


THE    HOME.  121 

early  evening,  before  the  chapel  bell  rang  for  "study  hours,"  when 
the  family  often  spent  a  few  moments  together  around  the  table, 
perhaps  in  games  of  spelling,  or  of  "word-making  and  word- 
taking,"  or,  maybe,  in  listening  while  one  read  aloud  a  chapter 
from  some  new  book.  My  first  appreciation  of  Mrs.  Stowe  as 
an  author,  was  formed  by  coming  down  to  hear  "Oldtown 
Folks"  read  in  this  manner. 

So  many  were  coming  and  going  that  the  family  was  seldom 
alone.  Whether  relatives,  old  students,  or  others,  all  were 
made  welcome,  and  "room  for  one  more"  was  always  found  at 
table.  The  presence  of  visitors  never  seemed  in  the  least  to 
disturb  the  routine  of  work  and  study.  Frequently  some  of  the 
teachers  and  students  were  invited  for  the  evening,  and  then 
books,  pictures,  curiosities  and  specimens  from  the  cabinet  (it 
was  before  Steinheim)  were  examined  and  discussed  in  such  a 
bright,  amusing  manner  that  the  visit  was  one  long  to  be 
remembered.  Such  evenings  closed  with  music,  readings,  reci- 
tations, or  speeches  from  some  of  the  friends  or  members  of  the 
family. 

President  Allen  was  sometimes  prevailed  upon  to  give  his 
lectures  in  other  places,  "Temperance,"  "The  Coming  Man," 
"The  Coming  Woman,"  and  "World  Building,"  were  among 
his  favorite  subjects.  A  trunk  was  taken  filled  with  specimens 
of  the  "stone  age,"  rocks,  fossils,  shells,  maps,  and  other  things 
to  use  in  illustrations.  More  than  once  those  who  came  to 
listen,  saw  for  the  first  time  how  the  earth's  history  has  been 
traced  by  the  finger  of  God  upon  the  very  stones  under  our  feet. 

Young  men  or  young  women  now  and  then  came  in  the 
evening  to  the  president's  study  to  talk  over  the  papers  they 
were  writing,  for  either  the  Commencement  or  "Jubilee"  sessions 
of  the  lyceums.  "President,  if  you  will  make  a  speech  to- 
morrow, it  would  help  me  as  nothing  else  can,  to  finish  the  sub- 
ject I  have  begun,"  was  not  an  uncommon  request.  And  those 
chapel  talks,  what  else  was  ever  like  them!  How  many  eyes 
they  opened  to  scorn  the  low  and  trivial,  and  cultivate  the  noble 
and  eternal!      How  many  went  out  from  them  fired  with   new 


122  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

desires,  new  ambitions,  to  live,  and  do,  and  suffer,  if  need  be, 
for  the  good  of  others!  How  the  help  they  gave  lingers  in  the 
hearts  of  many  till  this  day. 

Through  all  the  years  comes  back  the  president's  talk  one 
Wednesday  after  rhetorical  exercises,  when  the  students  were 
excused  to  stroll  in  the  woods.  They  were  reminded  that 
there  were  "things  better  than  beechnuts"  to  seek  after,  and 
urged  to  look  out  of  self  to  interpret  the  Father's  thought  to 
them  in  the  trees,  rocks,  and  hills — in  the  voices  of  the  falling 
leaves  and  flowing  waters.  To  one,  on  that  afternoon,  the  earth 
seemed  indeed  "holy  ground;"  the  lecture  had  awakened  a 
radiant  hope,  a  purpose  to  accomplish,  a  hungering  and  thirst- 
ing of  soul  before  unknown. 

The  following  extracts  are  taken  from  one  of  President 
Allen's  addresses: — 

THE  GREAT  LEGACY  OE  THE  PRESENT  TO  THE  FUTURE. 

"The  great  legacies  of  the  present  to  the  future  are  the  children.  All 
other  gifts  sink  into  insignificancy  before  these.  What  are  farms,  and 
shops,  and  merchandise,  and  gold,  and  silver,  in  comparison  with  chil- 
dren ?  Yet,  in  the  everyday  bustle  and  drive  of  life,  the  parent  may 
foro-et  that  to  his  care  are  committed  spirits  with  capacities  for  perpetual 
growth,  and  that  he  should  not  use  his  children  as  agencies  for  amassing 
wealth,  counting  their  worth  -by  the  dollars  and  cents  they  can  earn. 
Let  sickness  and  death  mark  his  child  for  a  victim,  and  how  will  the 
parental  heart  be  stirred!  How  will  conscience  speak!  How  will  he 
pray,  weep,  agonize!  How  willingly  would  he  give  the  whole  world, 
were  it  his  to  give,  if  health  and  life  could  thereby  be  purchased  for  the 
stricken  one!  What  are  wealth  and  honor  now?  If  such  is  the  value 
of  health  and  life  and  physical  well  being,  how  should  parents  regard  the 
spiritual  welfare  of  their  children!  Next  to  their  own  soul's  salvation, 
it  is  the  duty  of  parents  to  seek  the  spiritual  interests  of  their  children, 
to  prepare  them  to  enter  properly  upon  the  great  mission  of  life.  The 
little  hands  clasping  our  hands,  the  little  feet  following  fast  in  our  foot- 
steps, and  crowding  into  every  place  and  station,  little  hearts  freighted 
with  eternal  forces — these  are  to  be  led,  guided,  cultured.  These  little 
ones,  full  of  immortal  vigor,  nurtured  into  all  that  is  generous  and  manly, 
into  all  scholar!)-  and  Christian  nobleness,  are  the  greatest  gifts  which  it 


THE    HOME. 


123 


is  possible  for  the  present  to  bestow  upon  tlie  future.  What  is  a  farm 
to  a  noble  child  ?  Yet  how  often  does  the  father  toil  all  of  his  days  to 
leave  a  good  farm,  or  interest-bearing  stocks,  and  therewith  a  miserable 
son.  He  has  been  a  good  business  man,  but  a  most  negligent  parent. 
The  world  may,  or  may  not,  thank  him  for  his  propert}';  but  it  will  most 
assuredly  curse  him  for  his  children.  Children  will  write  the  names  of 
their  parents  upon  the  coming  age,  either  in  letters  of  light,  or  in  letters 
dark  and  lurid. 

HOME    AND    PARENT. 

"  Fast  by  the  portals  of  the  land  of  life  and  of  promise,  over  against 
each  other,  upon  the  Ebals  and  Gerizims  of  cursings  and  of  blessings, 
stand  parents,  teachers,  and  preachers,  beneath  whose  benedictions  or 
maledictions  must  pass  all  generations  in  their  march  to  their  possessions. 
The  parent  stands  first,  makes  the  first  impressions,  awakens  the  latent 
powers  of  the  soul,  touches  first  the  chords  of  affection,  controls  the 
influences  that  first  affect  character.  The  parent  stands  by  when  the 
child  first  chooses  between  right  and  wrong,  between  life  and  death;  and 
great  is  the  power  granted  him  over  these  decisions.  The  child  works 
or  plays,  goes  or  comes,  weeps  or  laughs,  is  lazy  or  industrious,  honest 
or  dishonest,  liberal  or  parsimonious,  religious  or  irreligious,  in  short,  a 
blessing  or  a  curse,  pretty  much  at  the  bidding  of  the  parent.  Who  are 
the  youth  growing  up  polluted  with  sin,  their  very  breath  a  sirocco  of 
death  ? — They  are,  for  the  most  part,  those  who  have  been  neglected  at 
home,  not  only  neglected,  perhaps,  but  have  received  positive  instruction, 
either  by  example  or  precept  or  both,  in  all  manner  of  evil.  Who 
promise  to  become  the  support  and  protection  of  everything  noble  and 
valuable  in  society — a  blessing  to  humanity?  Whence  have  sprung  the 
great  and  good  of  all  ages? — From  homes  consecrated  to  truth  and 
religion.  True,  the  good  may  in  after  times  be  changed  to  the  bad,  or 
the  bad  to  the  good ;  but  these  are  the  exceptions,  not  the  law.  Parents 
under  the  blessing  of  heaven  hold,  in  an  emphatic  sense,  the  keys  of  life 
and  death.  How  important,  then,  how  responsible,  the  parental  relation! 
What  undying  interests  cluster  around  their  power!  To  a  Christian 
parent,  desirous  of  blessing  the  world,  his  own  family  presents  one  of  the 
most  important  and  promising  fields  of  labor,  a  field  designed  by  Pro\i- 
dence  for  his  especial  culture.  All  other  fields  lie  round  about  this  field, 
not  in  opposition,  but  in  concentric  relations.  If  such  are  the  preroga- 
tives of  the  parent,  how  important,  even  imperative,  that  they  should  be 
rightly  employed!  If,  as  the  apostle  declares,  the  Christian  who  neglects 
to  provide  for  the  temporal  wants  of  his  family  has  denied  the  faith,  and 


124  LIl'E    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

is  worse  than  an  infidel,  what  terms  of  reprobation  are  sufficiently  strong 
and  scathing  for  those  who  neglect  the  spiritual  wants  of  their  families, 
sacrificing  all  for  wealth  or  fashion  ?  Neither  riches  nor  honor  can  com- 
pensate the  sacrifice. 

"Home  culture  is  preparatory  and  fundamental  to  all  special  training. 
It  is  laying  the  foundations  of  character.  It  awakens  latent  energies. 
It  is  the  period  of  first  and  strong  impressions.  Without  proper  bias 
given  now,  sad  will  be  the  future  unfoldings  of  character.  The  innocency 
of  infancy  may  thus  be  left  to  run  into  the  waywardness  of  youth  and 
the  degeneracy  of  age,  or  an  earlier  and  deeper  d)'e  may  be  given,  with 
a  more  terrible  range  of  consequences.  Spiritually  great  men  almost 
universally  ascribe  their  greatness  to  early  impressions,  impulses  given 
them  by  their  mothers,  whose  prayers  and  examples  have  been  as  the 
dews  of  heaven  upon  their  after  lives.  Biography  continually  points  to 
home  as  the  nursery  of  most  ministers,  missionaries, .  reformers,  bene- 
factors, wherein  impulses  there  given  become  a  part  of  the  child's  nature, 
growing  with  his  growth,  strengthening  with  his  strength.  The  culture 
of  such  homes  blends  restraints,  preventatives,  awakenings,  and  unfold- 
ings, checking  the  lower  and  awakening  the  higher  forces  of  the  soul. 
The  young  spirit  needs  to  grow  amid  the  genial  influences  of  love,  and 
the  high  inspiration  of  noble  examples,  and  the  light  of  great  and  solemn 
truths,  thereby  led  to  seek  goodness  and  greatness  as  its  natural  destiny, 
its  lawful  inheritance.  Having  been  educated  in  all  nobleness  and  good- 
ness at  home,  then  are  the  young  fitted  for  the  further  culture  of  the 
schools." 


-^ 


CHAPTER  XV/II. 

WAGATION  TOUR  IM  EUROPE. 

(^^^^^^  ETWEEN   the  years  of  1875  and    1882  an  earnest 
|— ==^    effort  was  made  to  advance  all  departments  of  .the 

Jl^ ^   work.      New  apparatus  and  building-s  were  needed 

to  meet  the  growing  demands.  Professor  Larkin, 
with  his  usual  enthusiasm,  was  collecting  funds  from  old  stu- 
dents, teachers,  and  friends,  to  carry  forward  the  completion  of 
the  Kenyon  Memorial  Hall.  The  library,  chemical  and 
mechanical  departments,  with  all  other  interests  of  the  Institu- 
tion, were  in  constant  need  of  means  for  enlargement  and  com- 
pletion, so  that  the  necessary  outlay  of  funds  much  exceeded 
the  income.  The  constant  strain  to  make  one  dollar  do  the 
work  of  ten  became  so  great  that  the  continued  effort  of  mak- 
ing "bricks  without  straw"  began  to  tell  upon  Mr.  Allen's 
health  and  vigor.  My  own  health,  so  long  nearly  perfect,  now 
seemed  failing,  thus  adding  sleepless  nights  to  his  many  cares. 
Our  eldest  daughter,  Evangel,  who  had  cheerfully  shared  all 
the  home  burdens,  married,  and  moved  away.  Added  to  all, 
his  nervous  system  was  still  suffering  from  the  effects  of  the 
smallpox,  which  he  had  in  1879.  His  friends  observed  his  fail- 
ing health,  and  after  a  time  succeeded  in  inducing  him  to  accept 
the  invitation  of  Mr.  Charles  Potter  to  go  to  Europe. 

In  the  following  pages  Dr.  A.  H.  Lewis  enables  the  reader 
to  follow  our  travelers  from  point  to  point  and  gather  a  reflec- 
tion of  those  experiences  which  brought  them  the  richly-earned 
rest,  opportunities,  and  pleasure.  To  recall  this  journey  was  a 
never-failing  source  of  pleasure  to  President  Allen,  as  well  as 
of  profit  to  his  friends. 

(125) 


126  LIFE    OF    I'RKSIDFXT    AIJ.EN, 


THE    CRAM    CLUIJ. 


A  Special  expression  of  personal  regard  for  President  Allen 
was  made  by  Charles  Potter,  Jr.,  Plainfield,  N.  J.,  in  the  spring 
of  1882.  Noticing  that  he  was  weary  from  overwork  and 
anxiety,  Mr.  Potter  decided  that  an  extended  rest,  and  change 
of  scene,  would  be  a  means  of  profit  and  pleasure  to  the  Presi- 
dent, and  a  lasting  benefit  to  the  University.  This  resulted  in 
his  making  President  Allen  his  guest  for  a  European  trip.  At 
the  same  time  George  H.  Babcock,  of  Plainfield,  determined  to 
make  the  same  trip,  with  A.  H.  Lewis  as  his  guest.  So  it 
came  about  that  a  party  of  four  congenial  spirits  entered  upon 
an  experience  which  proved  pleasant,  profitable,  and  beneficial 
in  the  highest  degree.  It  deepened  friendships  already  exist- 
ing, and  strengthened  ties  which  have  continued  to  hold  the 
o-roup  in  closest  union.  The  "calling  home"  of  President 
Allen  breaks  the  circle,  and  the  remaining  ones  (one  of  whom 
writes  these  lines)  feel  the  deeper  loneliness  because  so  much 
of  what  is  brightest  and  best  in  the  memory  of  those  days,  was 
contributed  by  him,  whom  all  so  sincerely  mourn. 

Before  the  outward  ocean  voyage  was  completed,  the  party 
was  informally  organized  for  literary  purposes  as  ''The  Cram 
Club."  The  itinery  determined  upon  included  Ireland,  Scot- 
land, England,  Italy,  Switzerland,  Germany,  and  Holland. 
President  Allen's  choices  touching  scenes  of  scientific  and  his- 
toric interest,  formed  a  large  factor  in  determining  the  places  to 
be  visited.  Every  facility  was  furnished  for  the  ease  and  com- 
fort of  the  Club.  Times  and  methods  of  travel  were  chosen 
which  would  accomplish  the  purpose  of  enjoying  the  best  in 
natural  scenery,  art,  literature,  science,  and  religion,  which  the 
Old  World  can  offer,  and  yet  conduce  to  the  greatest  physical 
comfort  and  health  of  the  party.  President  Allen  entered  into 
it  all  with  the  zest  of  a  scholar,  the  enthusiasm  of  a  specialist,  in 
many  departments,  and  the  untrammeled  enjoyment  which 
comes  where  common  choices  and  growing  friendships  crown 
all  plans  and  all  purposes.  From  time  to  time  each  member  ol 
the  Club  wrote  letters  to  the  Subbath  Recorder. 


VACATION    TOUR    IN    EUROPE.  1 27 

The  purpose  of  this  chapter  will  be  served  best  by  permit- 
ting the  reader  to  catch  glimpses  of  the  trip,  and  especially  of 
President  Allen,  through  extracts  from  these  letters.  His  let- 
ters, which  were  fewer  than  his  friends  wished  (he  hoped  to 
write  more  after  reaching  home),  will  be  given  nearly  in  full. 
Extracts  from  those  of  the  other  members  will  be  given  only 
when  necessary  to  let  the  readers  see  more  of  the  president, 
the  worthy  "Nestor"  of  the  Club,  than  they  would  otherwise 
do.      His  signature,  "Prex,"  appears  with  his  letters. 

Of  the  opening  of  the  voyage,  one  wrote: — 

"On  the   13th  of  June  a  party  of  weary  workers  embarked  on  the  • 
steamship    Arizona,  for  a  summer's    rest    in    foreign    lands.     After    the 
enthusiastic  "  Godspeeds  "  had  been  said  by  loving  friends,  their  floral 
tributes  duly  admired,  and  the  city  of  New  York  had  faded  into  the  dis- 
tance, an  account  was  taken  of  the  party,  to  know  who  was  who.     .     . 

"The  names  adopted  were  'Prex,'  'Parson,'  'Press,'  and  'Pundit,'  the 
latter  because  of  the  outrageous  way  in  which  he  punned  it.  As  an 
expression  of  the  compression  of  so  much  multuvi  in  parvo,  we  dubbed 
ourselves  the  'Cram  Club,'  a  name  which,  no  doubt,  the  steward 
thought  we  richly  deserved  before  the  voyage  was  over.  The  two 
'Profs.,'  at  least,  expected  to  return  home  crammed  full  of  information 
on  a  variety  of  subjects. 

OUTWARD    BOUND. 

"Our  good  ship  carried  us  so  smoothly  and  .steadily  we  found  it  hard 
to  realize  that  we  were  rushing  through  the  water  at  the  rate  of  twenty- 
seven  feet  per  second.  Old  ocean  presented  her  calmest  aspect  all  the 
way,  doubtless  lulled  to  rest  by  the  venerable  appearance  and  flowing 
beards  of  several  of  the  party,  enough  like  Neptune  to  have  been  his 
sons;  and,  as  a  consequence,  instead  of  sorrowful  stories  of  seasick  suf- 
ferings, we  have  the  pleasure  to  report  that  the  Cram  Ckib  were  on  duty 
at  every  meal  during  the  voyage. 

"On  the  morning  of  the  eighth  day  out,  while  we  were  at  breakfast, 
word  came  that  land  was  in  sight.  True,  however,  to  the  traditions  of 
the  Club,  all  sat  through  the  remainder  of  the  meal,  without  missing  a 
dish,  and  then,  seizing  their  fieldglasses,  rushed  upon  deck.  Two  sharp 
peaks  slowly  coming  out  of  the  mi.sty  distance  and  the  dim  outline  of  a 
range  of  mountains  were  all  that  could  be  seen.  We  soon  found,  how- 
ever, we  were  off  the  Skelligs,  on   the  coast  of  Ireland,  some  sixtv  miles 


128  I.IFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

north  of  our  course,  owing  to  the  fogs,  which  had  hidden  the  sun  for 
three  daj's.  Old  Sol,  however,  now  put  in  an  appearance,  and  a  more 
delightful  sail  was  ne\er  enjoyed  by  a  happier  crowd  than  was  on  the 
Arizona  that  morning.  Prex's  and  Parson's  noses  had  put  on  their 
brightest  bloom  during  the  voyage,  and  now,  joined  with  their  genial 
smile  and  beaming  countenances,  added  brillianc}-  to  the  occasion,  like 
Jupiter  and  Mars  among  the  starr)-  hosts.     .     .     . 

QUEENSTOWN. 

"At  Queenstown  we  only  stopped  long  enough  to  telegraph  home' 
to  make  a  hasty  visit  to  the  Cathedral,  to  experience  the  sensation  of 
being  foreigners  in  a  foreign  land,  and  to  get  a  taste  of  the  irrepressible 
Irish  beggar  in  the  old  hags  who  persisted  in  forcing  upon  us  sprigs  of 
shamrock,  when  we  took  a  small  steamer  up  the  charming  river  Lee  to 
Cork.  In  the  early  evening,  amid  beauties  of  hill  and  verdure  rarel}- 
surpassed,  past  castle  and  moat,  and  villa  and  cottage,  queer-looking 
sails  and  swift-gliding  steamers,  with  the  added  charm  of  a  bright-eyed 
Irish  maiden,  with  the  richest  of  brogues,  to  rehearse  the  traditions  of  the 
river — thus  passed  our  first  evening  as  foreigners." 

THE    TRIP    NORTHWARD. 

Another  member  of  the  Club  described  the  trip  nothward, 
from  which  the  following  touches  are  taken: — 

"  Five  miles  out  from  Cork  we  pass  in  sight  of  the  famous  Blame}- 
Castle,  built  in  1446,  by  McCarthy,  then  one  of  the  petty  kings  of  Ireland, 
of  which  it  had  five.  In  it  is  the  famous  Blarne}'  stone,  which  tradition 
says  lent  to  him  who  kissed  it  a  free  tongue.  It  is  so  located  in  the 
wall  that  those  who  kissed  it  had  to  climb  down  to  it  head  first,  or  be 
let  down  by  the  heels  by  an  assistant.  To  accomplish  this,  the  w^omen 
were  put  into  sacks,  which,  tied  around  the  neck,  left  only  the  head  out; 
but  the  sacks  were  few  and  expensive,  and  the  arch  enemy  did  not  invent 
paper  sacks  and  sell  them  for  a  half  cent  each,  until  after  the  castle 
became  a  ruin,  and  this  practice  had  fallen  into  disuse,  which  accounts 
for  the  fact  that  so  few  Irish  women  can  use  their  tongues  glibh'(?). 

"I-^arther  on,  while  two  of  our  Club  were  taking  observations  with 
their  glasses,  they  uttered  a  scream  of  delight,  for  they  had  discovered 
another  'ruin.'  A  little  farther  on,  and  another  came  into  view.  Both 
seemed  to  be  the  lower  portion  of  what  might,  in  some  remote  age,  have 
been  towers,  say  twenty-five  feet  square,  and  of  unknown  height,  but  for 
the  present,  perhaps  fifteen  feet  high.     In  our  compartment  of  the  car 


VACATION    TOUR    IN    EURORE.  .  1 29 

was  an  intelligent-looking  young  Irishman.  One  of  the  excited  mem_ 
bers  of  this  Club  addressed  our  Irish  friend:  'I  beg  your  pardon  sir,  but 
can  you  tell  us  what  ruins  those  are?'  He  took  a  look,  and  remarked, 
'Those  are  not  ruins,  gentlemen,  they  are  limekilns.'" 

PLEASANTRIES. 

Pleasantries  are  an  excellent  agency  in  promoting  rest. 
These  were  not  wholly  wanting,  nor  by  any  means  valueless,  in 
the  experiences  of  the  Club.  The  air  of  Ireland  produced  them 
as  naturally  as  appropriate  soil  does  strawberries.  The  genial, 
though  always  thoughtful,  Prex  contributed  his  share  The 
same  trip  which  developed  the  limekiln  ruins  furnished  still 
deeper  scientific  enjoyment,  as  the  following  will  show  :— 

"  Prex,  apparently,  was  asleep  in  the  corner  of  the  compartment.  It 
was  agreed  it  would  be  a  pity  to  disturb  him,  but  when  we  came  to  an 
extensive  peat  bog,  knowing  we  had  only  to  mention  anything  about 
geology  in  an  ordinary  tone,  and  it  would  wake  him  out  of  the  soundest 
sleep,  and  being  anxious  to  know  what  he  thought  of  it,  we  said,  'Geo- 
logical formations.'  You  ought  to  have  seen  how  quick  he  was  looking 
out  at  that  window,  with  fire  in  his  eye,  and  every  particular  hair  of 
enthusiasm  standing  on  end.  'Where  is  it?'  he  asked.  We  said  we 
were  wondering  to  what  formation  those  peat  bogs  belonged.  ,  He 
answered,  without  apparent  hesitation,  'The  same  formation  as  the  hard- 
pan  in  Alfred,  where  it  reaches  up  to  the  third  rail  in  the  fence,  only  the 
bog  has  more  vegetable  matter  of  the  two  in  it.'  His  knowledge  of 
these  things  is  wonderful,  isn't  it? 

"  Earnestly  looking  out  for  ruins,  two  of  the  Club  having  learned  to 
know  a  limekiln  from  a  castle,  we  discovered  some  animals.  At  the 
distance  from  which  we  saw  them,  it  was  quite  doubtful  whether  they 
were  Kerry  cows,  or  mules.  Knowing  that  Prex  was  tvell  up  in  '  Dar- 
win's descent  of  man,'  we  ventured  to  suggest  that  it  would  be  well  to 
get  his  decision  on  the  subject,  especially  as,  among  the  many  obstrep- 
erous animals  he  had  to  deal  with  in  the  last  few  years,  he  must  have 
become  well  acquainted  with  the  genus  mule.  We  ventured  to  jog  him 
again,  and  asked  him  to  tell  us  whether  they  were  mules  or  Kerry  cows. 
He  quietly  remarked  that  they  were  donkeys,  and  as  his  countenance 
beamed  graciously  upon  us,  he  said,  '  We  are  not  so  far  removed  from 
them  as  we  ought  to  be.'  We  could  not  quite  see  the  pertinence  of  the 
remark,  but  are  solemnly  of  the  opinion  that  when  the  young  men  of 


130  •  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

the  University  find  Prex  apparently  asleep,  they  had,  in  the  appropriate 
words  of  the  Songs  of  Solomon,  'better  not  stir  him  up  till  he  please.'" 

IRELAND. 

President  Allen  wrote  of  Ireland  as  follows:— 

"From  Killarney  the  Club  took  train  on  the  Great  Southern  and 
Western  Railway  of  Ireland,  in  a  first-class  car — a  kind,  it  is  said,  that 
none  save  aristocrats,  Americans,  and  fools  ride  in.  Being  Americans, 
the  Club  just  escaped  the  last-named  class.  The  plain  is  bordered  on 
the  south  by  the  Carherbarnagh  and  the  Baggeragh  Mountains.  The 
first  station  of  note  is  Mallow,  beautifully  located  on  the  banks  of  the 
Blackwater.  The  country  around  is  quite  romantic.  Here,  at  the  cas- 
tle of  Kilcalman,  Spenser  wrote  his  Faerie  Queen,  and  read  the  manu- 
script to  Raleigh  while  seated  on  the  banks  of  the  Aubeg  or  Mulla 
River. 

"  From  Mallow  to  Limerick  the  road  passes  through  a  beautiful  and 
fertile  valley,  with  the  Ballyhoura  Mountains  on  the  right  and  the  Mulla- 
garick  on  the  left.  Limerick  is  one  of  the  historic  cities  of  Ireland.  It 
is  situated  on  the  banks  of  the  Shannon,  the  most  beautiful  of  Irish 
rivers.  The  old  town  was  formerly  surrounded  by  a  massive  wall,  and 
withstood  many  a  siege,  the  most  modern  of  which  were  those  by  Crom- 
well and  William  the  Third.  The  cathedral  and  castle  of  Limerick  are 
noble  specimens  of  ancient  architecture. 

"  From  Limerick  to  Dublin  the  country  is  prairie-like,  beset  with 
peat  bogs.  Kildare,  a  city  (:)n  the  way,  was  renowned  in  olden  times  for 
its  saints.  In  the  chapel  of  St.  Bridget  a  perennial  fire  was  kept  burning 
for  a  thousand  years  by  the  nuns,  for  the  benefit  of  poor  strangers.  It 
is  noted  scientifically  at  present  for  the  fine  fossils  found  in  its  carbonif- 
erous limestone,  a  few  of  which  are  on  their  winding  way  to  Alfred. 

"After  restmg  the  Sabbath,  the  Club  did  the  city  on  an  Irish  jaunting 
car.  To  be  well  traveled,  one  must  needs  do  a  few  cities  mounted  on 
one  of  these  cars,  evidently  the  lineal  descendant  of  the  pack  saddle  of 
donkey  or  cow,  on  which  the  original  Irishman  journeyed  with  his  fam- 
ily from  Iran,  his  fatherland,  in  far  Asia.  The  saddlebags  of  country 
doctors  and  itinerant  parsons,  of  other  days,  were  a  degenerate  species  of 
the  same.  This  pack  saddle,  as  the  years  went  by,  slipped  from  donkey 
onto  a  pair  of  wheels.  The  Club  mounted  on  this,  back  to  back,  and 
reclining  on  one  elbow,  with  heads  up,  while  the  driver,  seated  on  the 
pummel,  drove  his  staunch,  fast-going  Irish  horse  mile  after  mile  without 
flagging,   over  the  city.      Dublin,  situated   on   the   river   Liffey,  and   the 


VACATION    TOUR    IN    EUROPE.  I3I 

second  city  of  the  British  Empire,  has  the  reputation  of  being  one  of  the 
cleanest,  most  orderly,  and  civil  cities  in  the  world,  and  the  Club  found 
it  sustaining^  well  its  reputation.  No  disorder,  no  drunkenness,  even  no 
smoking  of  cigars,  was  seen  in  its  streets. 

"  Phoenix  Park  is  second  in  size  among  European  parks.  Most  of  it 
is  left  in  the  natural  condition  of  pasture  lands,  and  well  stocked  with 
herds  of  cattle,  sheep,  and  deer.  The  prevailing  shrub  is  the  hawthorn, 
which,  left  to  grow  singl}^  over  the  ground,'  assumes  the  form  and 
appearance  of  an  apple  tree,  giving  to  large  tracts  of  the  park  the  appear- 
ance of  extensive  orchards. 

"Trinity  College,  or  Dublin  University,  has  College  Park  to  itself 
Its  original  charter  dates  back  to  131 1.  It  has  several  fine  buildings,  the 
most  important  of  which  are  the  Museum  and  Examination  Hall.  The 
collections,  outside  of  the  birds  of  Ireland,  are  comparatively  meager  for 
so  richly  endowed  an  institution.  The  students'  dining  hall  is  hung 
around  with  portraits  of  man)'  an  illustrious  man.  The  students  eat 
upon  greasy  old  oaken  tables  while  sitting  on  long,  backless  benches  for 
chairs.  It  would  be  interesting  to  note  how  American  students  would 
tieat  such  fare. 

"The  instruction  is  carried  on  by  means  of  lectures  and  periodical 
examinations.  The  examinations  under  the  direction  of  the  Intermedi- 
ate PIducation  Board  of  Ireland  were  in  progress,  corresponding  to  the 
Regential  examinations  in  the  State  of  New  York. 

"  Everywhere  and  always  the  Club  causes  stare  and  wonder.  When 
the  eyes  of  the  natives  are  once  set  upon  it,  they  remain  fixed  as  long 
as  the  Club  is  in  sight.  The  beholders  involuntarily  lift  themselves  to 
their  utmost  height  and  begin  feeling  for  their  beards,  and  calling  the 
attention  of  their  neighbors  to  the  bearded  giants.  Pundit's  smooth  lip, 
all  innocent  and  bland,  detracts  somewhat  from  the  dignity  of  the  scene. 
The  Parson  feels  sure  that  it  is  his  hat  which  is  attracting  so  much  atten- 
tion, having  been  assured  that,  with  such  a  hat,  he  would  be  arrested  for 
a  Fenian,  and  not  infrequently  he 

'  Glowers  around  with  prudent  care. 
Lest  boggles  catch  him  unaware  ; ' 

but  when,  hatless,  the  Club  marches  into  the  various  dining  halls,  the 
stare  is  all  the  same. 

"As  the  Club  crowds  itself  with  difficulty  into  one  of  the  hotel  ele- 
vators, the  waiter  remarks:  'Gentlemen,  you  are  severely  testing  the 
stren.gth  of  this  elevator.  It  never  lifted  such  a  load  before.'  At  first 
its  members  were  taken  for  returned  Australians,  rich  and  independent^ 
but  when   heard  to  speak,  the  American  origin  of  the  Club  was  made 


132  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

sure,  for  they  are  the  only  people,  the  natives  say,  who  speak  English 
clear  from  brogue. 

"From  Dublin  to  Belfast  the  country  rapidly  improves  in  appearance. 
This  region  having  been  settled  several  centuries  ago  largely  by  immi- 
grating Scotch  Presbyterians,  it  shows  all  the  energy  and  thrift  of  the 
Scotch  race.  The  Irish  riots  have  little  support  or  sympathy  here.  Few 
towna  have  progressed  in  importance  so  rapidly  as  Belfast.  In  the  course 
of  fifty  years  the  population  has  increased  nearly  sixfold  In  1879  ^^^ 
population  was  two  hundred  and  ten  thousand.  Of  these  fully  two- 
thirds  are  Protestants.  It  is  situated  on  the  river  Lagan,  just  before  it 
flows  into  the  elongated  bay,  known  as  Belfast  Lough.  Its  chief  indus- 
tries are  ship  building  and  the  manufacture  of  linen  goods.  The  general 
appearance  of  the  town  is  that  of  a  clean,  thrifty  city. 

giant's  ring, 

situated  about  four  miles  from  Belfast,  is  one  of  the  most  interesting 
works  of  antiquity  to  be  found  in  Ireland.  It  consists  of  an  enormous 
circle  more  than  one-third  of  a  mile  in  circumference.  It  is  inclosed  by 
an  immense  mound  of  earth,  about  eighty  feet  broad  at  the  base  and 
some  thirty  feet  in  height.  Near  the  center  stands  a  large  cromlech,  or 
stone  altar.  It  is  attributed  to  the  Druids,  constituting  one  of  the  chief 
places  where  they  performed  their  religious  rites,  offering  upon  the  altar 
human  sacrifices.     .     .     . 

Ireland  is,  indeed,  an  emerald  set  in  the  sea.  Nature  has  made  it 
wondrous  rich  and  beautiful.  The  Irish  have  one  of  the  finest  lands  in 
the  world,  but  they  are  both  priest  and  king  ridden,  and  seem,  as  Press 
sagely  remarks,  able  to  govern  every  land  but  their  own.  It  has  fur- 
nished some  of  the  brightest  intellectual  stars  of  which  both  Britain  and 
America  can  boast.  Down  in  the  southern  portion  the  people  are 
sprightly,  rollicking,  warm,  and  demonstrative,  yet  improvident  and  beg- 
garly. In  the  central  portion  the  people  are  more  hardy,  cool,  and 
reserved,  more  industrious  and  prosperous.  In  the  north  the  Scotch 
Presbyterian  element  gives  it  almost  a  New  England  type  of  energy, 
industry,  and  thrift.  In  the  south,  beggars  and  British  soldiers  hold 
equal  sway.  In  the  central  regions  a  few  of  each  are  found,  while  in  the 
north  scarcely  one  of  either  is  to  be  seen.  Both  blood  and  religion  tell 
wonderfully  here,  as  elsewhere.  Prex." 

From  Belfast  the  Club  took  steamer  for  Glasgow.  Few- 
men  are  better  prepared  to  enjoy  Scotland  than  was  President 
Allen.      A  poet  by  nature,  familiar  with   Scotch  literature  and 


VACATION  TOUR  IN  EUROPE.  1 33 

history,  an  enthusiastic  lover  of  mountains,  and  all  that  is  grand 
in  natural  scenery,  the  treasures  of  Scotland  gave  him  con- 
stant delight.  Prex  and  Parson  made  a  special  visit  to  Ayr, 
and  the  scenes  which  gave  birth  to  Tarn  O'Shanter  and  other 
of  Robert  Burns'  poems.  The  Club  visited  mountains  and 
lakes,  Stirling.  Edinburgh,  that  Athens  of  Europe,  Abbotsford, 
with  its  memories  of  Scotland's  greatest  novelist,  Melrose,  and 
Drybury,  and  so  southward  to  England.  On  the  way  to 
London  Prex  left  the  Club  at  Leicester,  that  he  might  visit 
Cambridge,  Oxford,  and  Stratford-upon-Avon  before  we  went  to 
the  continent.  He  wrote  of  these  places  that  which  appears 
below: — 

THE    HOME    OF    SHAKESPEARE. 

"Stratford-upon-Avon,  the  home  of  Shakespeare,  is  situated  upon 
the  Avon,  a  beautiful  river,  quietly  flowing  through  a  broad  and  fertile 
valley,  in  the  southwest  border  of  Warwickshire,  that  shire  which,  in 
olden  time,  was  well  called  the  heart  of  England.  Stratford  is  a  quaint 
old  town,  the  reddest  town  I  ever  set  eyes  on.  Being  built  of  a  very 
light  red  brick,  and  free  from  the  smoke  and  smut  of  manufacturing 
towns,  the  houses  have  a  wonderfully  bright  and  cheery  aspect.  It 
would  be  a  very  dull  town,  the  inhabitants  say,  if  it  were  not  for  Shakes- 
peare. His  constantly  widening  fame  and  influence  draw  an  ever- 
increasing  stream  of  travel  here,  the  great  majority  of  whom  are  Ameri- 
cans and  Germans.  The  hotel  registers  show  eight-tenths  of  all  the 
visitors  at  present  to  be  from  America. 

"The  people  of  Warwickshire,  including  Stratford,  are  physically  the 
finest  we  have  seen  in  England,  and  speak  English  freest  from  brogue. 
It  has  a  vibrant  roll  and  resonance  that  are  very  pleasing  to  the  ear. 

"The  house  in  which  Shakespeare  was  born,  after  having  passed 
through  many  changes  and  uses,  was,  in  1847,  bought  in  by  a  national 
subscription,  for  some  $16,000,  and  placed  in  the  hands  of  trustees  in 
behalf  of  the  nation.  Under  the  direction  of  the  Birthplace  Committee, 
it  has  been  restored,  as  near  as  possible,  to  its  original  condition.  The 
restoration  of  the  exterior  is  regarded  as  'the  most  careful  and  successful 
work  of  the  kind  ever  accomplished.'  The  internal  portion,  where  the 
family  lived,  remains  essentially  the  same  as  when  the  Shakespeare  family 
resided  here.  The  whole  building  is  in  the  Elizabethan  style  of  family 
residences. 


134  LIP^E    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

"On  enterinij  the  house  from  Henley  Street  the  visitor  first  passes 
into  the  old  family  kitchen.  The  floor  is  of  stone,  well  worn  with  the 
footsteps  of  three  hundred  years.  There  is  a  roomy  fireplace,  the  sides 
built  of  brick,  having  the  chimney-piece  above,  cut,  with  a  low  pointed 
arch,  out  of  a  massive  beam  of  oak.  At  either  end  of  the  fireplace  are 
stone  seats  built  into  the  jambs,  on  which  the  children  used  to  sit  to 
keep  warm  when  the  embers  were  low.  Stooping  low,  under  the  mantel- 
piece, I  crowded  myself  into  the  small  seat  where  little  William  was 
wont  to  sit,  with  cold  toes  and  benumbed  fingers,  and  wipe  off  his  tears 
with  his  sleeve,  or,  in  happier  moods,  crack  his  boyish  jokes  and  let  off 
poetic  squibs. 

"Above  the  kitchen  is  the  room  in  which  the  poet  was  born.  It  is  a 
low-roofed  apartment.  Huge  oaken  beams  project  from  the  plastered 
walls,  the  stairway  and  floor  of  thick  oaken  boards,  worm-eaten  and  worn. 
Myriad  penciled  and  inked  autographs  cover  the  walls,  ceilings,  and  win- 
dows, so  continuous  and  closely  written  as  to  give  the  walls  the  appear- 
ance of  being  covered  with  spider  webs. 

"Behind  the  birth-room,  entered  by  a  doorway  some  five  feet  high,  is 
another  curious  old  apartment,  whose  heavy  beams  and  thick  oaken  floor 
give  an  idea  of  strength  and  enduringness.  Portraits  of  the  poet  adorn 
the  walls;  the  chief  of  these  is  a  life-sized  bust  in  oil,  known  as  the  Strat- 
ford portrait.  It  was  found  in  an  old  house  here,  and  is  considered  a 
genuine  painting  from  life.  It  is  kept  in  an  iron  safe,  which  is  thrown 
open  during  the  day  and  closed  at  night. 

"Other  rooms  contain  the  Shakespearean  Library  and  Museum,  in 
which  are  to  be  found  copies  of  the  earliest  editions  of  liis  works,  and 
everything  obtainable  connected  with  him.  One  of  the  most  interesting 
objects  is  the  old  bench  and  writing  desk  occupied  by  Shakespeare  while 
a  boy  at  school.  The  way  in  which  he  both  used  and  misused  this  desk 
with  pen  and  ink  and  knife,  would  delight  the  eye  of  a  Yankee  boy,  who 
considers  the  chief  use  of  a  knife  to  whittle  desks.  I  was  permitted  to 
sit  in  the  chair  which  the  poet  used  to  occupy  when  he  presided  at  the 
meeting  of  the  Stratford  Club.  Washington  Irving,  in  his  'Sketch  Book,' 
asserts  that  from  its  constant  use  this  chair  had  to  be  re-bottomed  every 
three  years.  The  guides  say  that  Irving  drew  entirely  on  his  imagination 
for  this  statement,  as  the  original  oak  has  withstood  the  wear  and  tear  of 
three  hundred  years. 

"new  plack," 

the  home  of  Shakespeare's  mature  years,  and  where  he  died,  has  been 
entirely  destroyed;    but    the  garden  and    grounds  connected   therewith 


VACATION    TOUR    IN    EUROPE.  1 35 

have  been  converted  into  a  beautiful  little  park,  stretching  down  to  the 
Avon.     To  this  park  the  public  are  admitted. 

THE  CHURCH  OF  THE  HOLY  TRINITY, 

where  Shakespeare  is  buried,  stands  pleasantly  and  picturesquely  on  the 
banks  of  the  Avon.  It  is  supposed  to  have  been  originally  built  in  the 
time  of  William  the  Conqueror.  It  is  a  cruciform  building,  consisting  of 
a  nave  and  side  aisles,  a  transept,  and  a  chancel.  The  tower  and  spire 
rise  from  the  center  of  the  cross  to  a  height  of  one  hundred  and  sixty- 
three  feet.  From  gateway  to  doorway  the  visitor  passes  along  an  alley 
of  thick,  overarching  lime  trees. 

"The  gravestones  of  the  Shakespeare  family  lie  in  a  row  in  front  of 
the  altar  rails.  In  a  niche  at  one  side  is  a  half-length  figure  of  Shakes- 
peare, placed  there  within  seven  years  after  his  death,  by  his  daughter. 
The  bust  is  painted  and  supposed  to  have  been  taken  from  life.  It  repre- 
sents him  with  full,  round  face,  parted  lips,  large  hazel  eyes,  full  nose,  high 
forehead,  hair  and  beard  auburn.  The  dress  is  a  scarlet  doublet,  slashed 
on  the  breast,  over  which  is  a  loose  black  gown  without  sleeves.  Before 
him  is  a  cushion,  the  upper  part  crimson,  the  lower  green.  The  poet  is 
represented  as  writing  on  this  cushion.  The  right  hand  formerly  held  a 
pen.  Beneath  this  cushion  is  inscribed  in  Latin:  '  In  judgment  a  Nestor, 
in  genius  a  Socrates,  in  art  a  Virgil.  The  earth  covers  him,  the  people 
mourn  for  him,  Olympus  has  him.' 

"The  slab  placed  over  the  grave  of  Shakespeare  has  a  small  brass 
plate  with  this  curious  inscription  : — 

"  '  Good  friend,  for  Jesus'  sake  forbeare 
To  dig  the  dust  enclosed  heare; 
Blesse  be  ye  man  yt  spares  the  stones. 
And  cusst  be  he  yt  moves  my  bones.' 

"Prex." 

Touching  educational  matters,  as  a  whole,  the  president 
wrote  the  following: — 

CONCERNING    SCHOOLS. 

"Leaving  a  more  detailed  account  of  the  internal  operations  of  the 
schools  of  Scotland  and  England  to  some  future  occasion,  I  here  give 
simply  a  bird's-eye  view  of  their  external  appearance. 

"The  new  buildings  of  Glasgow  University  are,  both  as  to  location 
and  architectural  design,  the  finest  school  buildings  in  the  British  Isles. 
It  stands  on  an  eminence,  overlooking  a  curve  of  Kelvin  Grove  Park, 
and  commands  a  splendid  view  over  a  great  part  of  Renfewshire.     It  is  a 


136  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

rectangular  structure,  six  hundred  feet  long  and  three  hundred  feet  broad, 
and  is  planned  in  two  quadrangles,  divided  by  the  Common  Hall.  It  has 
a  south  main  frontage  of  five  hundred  and  thirty-two  feet,  with  a  tower 
and  spire  when  complete,  three  hundred  feet  high.  The  estimated  cost 
is  to  be  ^2,430,000.  We  spent  a  pleasant  hour  looking  through  its  mu- 
seum, library,  dining  room,  and  other  parts. 

"The  University  of  Edinburgh  is  in  a  low-lying,  unpleasant  location. 
Its  surroundings  of  narrow  and  crowded  streets  deprive  its  substantial 
buildings  of  much  of  their  effect  externally;  but  a  view  of  the  interior  of 
the  quadrangle  completely  changes  the  first  impression  of  the  visitor. 
The  buildings  around  the  quadrangle  form  a  fine  architectural  composi- 
tion. The  university  was  founded  in  1582,  by  a  charter  from  James  VI. 
It  has  never  possessed  the  great  revenues  of  many  other  universities,  but 
has  attained  to  its  world-wide  renown  through  the  eminence  of  many  of 
its  professors,  especially  in  metaphysics,  classics,  and  medicine.  Professor 
Huxley  has  recently  been  elected  to  its  chair  of  natural  history  at  a  salary 
of  ;$  1 0,000  a  year. 

RUGBY. 

"Whoever  has  read  either  the  'Life  of  Dr.  Arnold,'  or  'Tom  Brown 
at  Rugby,'  cannot  fail  to  have  a  warm  and  abiding  interest  in  Rugby. 
Rugby  is  situated  on  a  fertile  plain,  and  had  been  a  very  quiet  place  till 
the  railways  broke  in  upon  its  peace,  deriving  its  chief  interest  from  its 
school.  The  school  is  one  of  the  four  great  preparatory  schools  where 
the  English  youth  fit  for  Oxford  or  Cambridge.  When  Dr.  Arnold  be- 
came its  head  master,  it  at  once  was  lifted  out  of  the  dull  level  routine 
pervading  the  schools  at  that  time,  and  became  a  leading  influence  in  bet- 
tering the  condition  of  English  education. 

"The  boys,  upon  their  ample  playground,  appeared  very  much  as 
Tom  Brown  described  them — boys  ranging  from  eight  to  sixteen  years  of 
age.  The  grounds  are  ample,  and  shaded  with  magnificent  elms  and 
limes.  Sheep  share  the  grounds  with  the  boys,  and  keep  the  grass  short 
for  the  convenience  of  play.  The  boys  are  gathered  in  four  or  five  board- 
ing halls,  each  presided  over  by  a  teacher. 

"The  old  chapel  in  which  Dr.  Arnold  preached  has  been  replaced  by 
a  new  one,  built  on  the  same  spot.  Arnold's  body  is  buried  directly  be- 
neath where  the  communion  table  stood  in  the  old  chapel,  a  plate  of  glass, 
with  his  name  inscribed  thereon,  marking  the  spot.  As  we  stood  over 
the  spot,  we  mutually  agreed  that  he  was  a  great  man,  and  one  that  had 
been,  and  still  is,  a  power  in  the  cause  of  education.  The  chair  and  desk 
used  by  him  in  the  class  room  are  preserved  in  an  alcove  as  sacred  relics. 


VACATION    TOUR    IN    EUROPE.  13;' 

The  backless  benches,  and  level  boards,  bespattered  with  ink,  for  desks 
for  the  boys,  remain  as  of  old,  reminding  one  of  the  time  of  old  log  school- 
houses  in  America.  The  English  evidently  believed  in  giving  backbone 
to  their  boys  by  compelling  them  to  use  it  for  self-support.  It  was  curi- 
ous to  note  how  even  educated  youth  persist  in  the  misapplication  of  the 
'h.'     It  was  Dr.  Harnold  every  time. 


"It  was  natural  and  easy  to  follow  Tom  Brown  from  Rugby  to  Ox- 
ford. Oxford  University  is  emphatically  a  city  of  colleges,  clustered  to- 
gether down  by  the  river,  where  the  old  ford  for  oxen  crossed  the  Upper 
Thames,  given  here  the  more  classical  name  of  Isis.  The  various  col- 
leges are  all  built  after  the  same  monastic  type.  Each  is  composed  of 
one  to  four  quadrangles,  with  the  buildings  of  each  quadrangle  facing  in 
upon  an  open  court,  with  their  backs  turned  upon  the  world,  looking  out 
to  it  through  small  and  often  barred  windows.  The  Oxford  building 
stone,  being  a  soft,  friable  tertiary  limestone,  is  easily  worked,  and  its  light 
cream  color  gives  it  a  pleasing  effect  while  new,  but  it  easily  crumbles 
under  the  tooth  of  time.  This  has  given  to  the  college  buildings,  a  few 
centuries  old,  a  wonderfully  gnawed  and  ragged  appearance.  This  has 
been  rendered  still  worse  by  an  attempt  in  some  former  age  to  preserve 
the  stone  by  covering  it  with  a  coating  of  cement.  Time  has  broken  and 
pealed  this  coating,  leaving  it  hanging  in  black  scabs  and  blisters.  The 
buildings,  as  a  whole,  have  a  decidedly  monkish  aspect. 

"Cambridge,  in  this  as  in  several  other  respects,  has  a  more  modern 
appearance.  Having  no  building  stone  in  its  neighborhood,  it  at  first 
built  with  brick.  These,  of  late  years,  have  been  replaced  or  cased  with 
stone,  largely  the  Portland,  giving  it  quite  a  modernized  appearance. 
Cambridge  has  also  the  finer  college  park  and  grounds.  The  Cam,  being 
a  smaller  and  less  rapid  river  than  the  Isis,  has  been  largely  utilized  for 
beautifying  the  grounds  and  for  the  pleasure  of  students.  It  has  been 
walled  into  a  channel  from  forty  to  eighty  feet  wide,  with  diminutive 
canals  leading  off,  here  and  there,  through  the  park,  the  river  itself  run- 
ning through  some  of  the  college  quadrangles.  The  walks  are  bordered 
by  thick,  overarching  elms  and  clear,  running  streams,  making  one  of 
the  most  picturesque  and  delightful  parks  that  I  have  seen. 

"I  attended  service  at  Christ  Church  College,  Oxford,  and  listened 
to  a  most  artistic  intoning  and  reading.  Preparatory  to  this,  I  had  lis- 
tened to  the  greatest  clangor  of  bells.  Probably  it  would  be  difficult  to 
find  elsewhere  an  equal  number  of  bells  in  the  same  area  as  swing  in  the 


l^S  LIFE    OP^    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

belfries  of  these  clustered  colleges,  and  when  set  to  swinging  at  the  same 
time  their  clanging  is  bewildering. 

"  The  people  of  Oxford  are  physically  the  worst  looking,  and  the 
people  of  Cambridge  have  the  worst  brogue,  of  any  we  have  met  in 
England.  Prex." 

From  England  the  Club  went  to  Paris,  and  saw  it  in  detail; 
from  Paris,  to  Switzerland,  by  way  of  Geneva,  beautiful  and 
historic;  up  Lake  Geneva  and  the  Rhone,  to  Martigny ;  over 
the  Tete  Noire  Pass  to  Chamouni,  Mt.  Blanc,  Montauvert, 
Mer  de  Glace,  etc.  All  this  must  be  passed  here  with  a  few 
touches.  In  crossing  the  mountains  from  Martigny  to  Cha- 
mouni, Prex  and  Parson  indulged  in 

MAKING    HAY, 

which  was  duly  chronicled  in  these  words: — - 

"Higher  up  we  are  beyond  all  but  thin  meadows  and  mountain  ever- 
greens. The  fields  are  full  of  people.  Haying  is  fairly  begun.  Most 
of  the  workers  are  women.  They  do  the  heaviest  parts.  The  scene 
awoke  boyhood  memories  in  Prex  and  Parson,  and  at  one  point,  far 
up  the  mountain,  where  in  a  little  meadow  three  women  and  one  old 
man  were  mowing,  they  climbed  the  wall  which  kept  the  meadow  from 
sliding  into  the  path,  and  astonished  the  natives  by  proposing  to  finish 
the  meadow  on  a  short  contract.  Evidently  deeming  it  a  huge  joke,  the 
old  man  yielded  his  scythe  to  the  Parson,  and  a  comely  Swiss  maiden, 
with  uncontrollable  laughter,  gave  hers  to  Prex.  The  swaths  are  car- 
ried diagonally  down  the  steep  incline.  The  scythes  are  short,  broad, 
.straight,  the  snaths  an  indescribable  combination  of  straight  sticks  and 
pegs  set  at  different  angles.  One  could  stand  only  by  planting  his  heels 
deep  in  the  soft  earth  at  each  step,  and  leaning  in  part  upon  the  stout 
snath  at  every  stroke.  We  soon  conquered  the  situation  and  finished 
full  swaths  in  triumph.  This  brought  loud  applause,  and  the  joyous 
laughter  of  the  women  followed  us  until  we  were  out  of  hearing.  It  was 
evidently  the  event  of  the  season." 

Some  experiences  in  and  about 

CHAMOUNI    AND    MT.     BLANC 

must  be  retold,  because  the  story  is  so  nearly  a  personal  one 
concerning  the  president.      Of  him  one  of  the  Club  said: — 


VACATION  TOUR  IN  EUROPE.  1 39 

"  Have  you  ever  seen  New  York  newsboys  on  their  first  day  in  the 
country?  Then  you  have  some  idea  of  the  cahii  enthusiasm  with  which 
these  two  sedate  and  venerable  college  professors  took  their  first  view  of 
a  glacier.  From  the  hotel  it  showed  us  a  surface  about  one  mile  in 
width  and  six  miles  long,  like  the  surface  of  a  sea  whose  high  tossing 
billows  and  deep  hollows  have  been  frozen  solid  in  a  moment,  or  like 
an  instantaneous  photograph  of  a  raging  sea.  Farther  up  the  mountain 
they  told  us  we  could  see  miles  more  of  the  river  of  ice,  with  its  three 
converging  branches,  and  so  Prex  and  Parson  proposed  to  climb  the 
mountain  and  see.  Pundit  set  his  aneroid  to  the  known  height  of  the 
hotel,  one  thousand  nine  hundred  and  twenty-one  meters  (six  thousand 
feet),  and,  with  Alpine  stocks  in  hand,  we  started.  At  six  thousand 
eight  hundred  feet  the  guide  said  we  were  as  far  as  was  usual  to  go,  but 
from  here  there  was  no  better  view  than  from  below.  Above  was  a  wild 
waste  of  broken  stone,  and  the  guide  said  there  was  no  path,  but  by  this 
time  Prex  was  far  above  us,  and  on  we  followed,  over  rocks  and  patches 
of  ancient  snow,  with  now  and  then  a  bright  green  nook  spangled  with 
beautiful  forget-me-nots,  mountain  daisies, — 'marguerite,' — and  blue 
gentian,  until  we  stood  on  a  plateau  seven  thousand  four  hundred  feet 
high,  giving  a  charming  view  of  the  valley  below.  Chamouni  was  like 
a  toy  village  at  our  feet,  and  the  distant  roar  of  the  Arve  came  to  our 
ears  like  the  dying  murmur  of  an  evening  hymn.  We  could  trace  its 
course  like  a  thread  of  silver,  from  its  source  in  the  Glacier  de  Argentier, 
down  through  the  valley  a  long  way  toward  Geneva,  where  it  joins  the 
Rhone.  Six  thousand  feet  above  us  rose  the  sharp  pinnacles  of  the 
Aiguilles  Vert,  while  behind  them  were  the  equally  inaccessible  Aiguilles 
de  Blailierre  and  dii  Plan,  like  the  pinnacles  of  an  enormous  Gothic 
cathedral.  One  can  see  here  whence  arose  the  inspiration  in  those 
architects  of  old  who  have  given  us  such  poems  in  stone  as  the  cathedrals 
at  Cologne  and  Milan.  But  beautiful  as  the  view  was  from  here,  it  gave 
us  nothing  more  of  the  Mer  de  Glace,  and  so  Prex  and  Parson  mounted 
still  higher,  but  Pundit  was  content  to  rest  here  to  enjoy  the  scene,  and 
watch  some  adventurous  sheep  which  had  wandered  thus  far  in  search 
of  pasturage.  Prex  followed  the  guide  for  a  while,  until  he  found  he  was 
crawling  along  the  face  of  a  cliff,  where  a  misstep  would  have  sent  him 
headlong  three  thousand  feet  into  the  valley,  when  he  backed  out,  and 
sought  a  path  of  his  own,  which,  if  no  better,  at  least  did  not  make  quite 
so  bold  an  exhibit  of  its  dangers,  and  pretty  soon  he  and  Parson  stood 
on  a  point  seven  thousand  six  hundred  feet  high,  from  which  we  noticed 
that  the  cry  'PLxcelsior'  came  down  to  us  in  rather  wavering  tones,  and 


140  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

not  long  after  the  D.  D.'s  followed.  It  is  wonderful  how  many  things 
a  practical  eye  will  find  in  a  pile  of  rocks.  Prex  gathered  specimen  after 
specimen,  which  the  guide  took  good-naturedly,  and  put  into  his  pockets 
— and  what  pockets  they  were!  I  never  saw  so  many  on  mortal  man 
before;  but  they  were  all  full  before  we  got  back,  the  guide  remarking 
that  'he  was  willing  to  carry  all  he  could,  but  he  couldn't  carry  the  whole 
mountain ! '     .     .     . 

MER    DE    GLACE. 

"After  a  lunch  and  rest  at  the  Montauvert  Hotel  we  started  to  cross 
the  glacier.  Descending  the  steep  face  of  the  gorge  seven  hundred  and 
fifty  feet,  we  came  to  the  foot  of  the  moraine.  Here  in  a  little  shanty, 
Prex  found  some  fine  fossils  gathered  from  the  debris  of  the  glacier, 
which  were  quickly  purchased  and  added  to  the  load  of  the  guide.  The 
moraine  here  is  about  one  hundred  feet  high,  and  over  it  we  clambered, 
passing  boulders  as.  large  as  a  good-sized  house,  and  came  to  the  edge 
of  the  ice,  where  we  had  another  climb,  or  clitne,  if  you  choose  to  spell 
it  that  way,  up  steps  cut  into  its  glassy  surface. 

"The  face  of  the  glacier  is  anything  but  smooth  or  clean,  but  is 
wrinkled  and  dirty  as  the  face  of  an  Italian  beggar,  magnified  one  thou- 
sand diameters.  Little  rills  of  ice-cold  water,  clear  as  crystal,  trickle 
down  its  surface  and  gather  in  its  hollows  and  form  streams,  which  soon 
disappear  in  some  crevasse,  to  see  the  light  next  at  the  foot  of  the  glacier. 
One  large  stream  ran  into  a  hole  a  few  feet  in  diameter,  with  a  roar,  and 
was  lost  to  view.  We  cared  not  to  trace  its  way  through  the  six  hun- 
dred feet  of  ice  to  the  bottom,  where  it  joined  its  fellows.  It  was  wel- 
come to  go  alone,  so  far  as  we  were  concerned.  There  was  a  strip  of 
stones  and  dirt  down  the  middle  of  the  glacier,  which  seemed  at  first  to 
be  a  center  moraine,  but  which  was  only  a  little  windrow  of  dirt  upon 
its  surface.  Here  Prex  and  Parson  paused,  held  a  mass  meeting,  and 
passed  a  unanimous  vote  of  thanks  to  Providence,  and  everybody  con- 
cerned, for  the  privileges  of  the  day.     .     .     . 

"  Beyond  the  Mmivais  pas  we  come  to  the  Chapcaii,  a  resting  place 
so  called  from  a  rock  which  overhangs  it,  and  assumes  a  form  suggesting 
the  name.  Here  we  stop  a  little,  to  rest  and  take  some  slight  refresh- 
ment, while  Prex  uncovers  his  head,  and,  with  becoming  gravity,  drinks 
to  the  health  of  the  overhanging  cliffs.  Well  may  he  wish  to  propitiate 
them,  for  has  he  not  been  robbing  them  of  choice  treasures,  which  are 
swelling  his  every  pocket,  and  peeping  out  at  unexpected  places?  He 
afterwards  admitted  having  pocketed  no  less  than  forty-four  different 
varieties  of  plants  and  flowers,  all  of  which  were  new  to  him.     .     .     . 


VACATION    TOUR    IN    EUROPE.  I4I 

"The  sun  was  giving  his  last  good-night  kiss  to  Mont  Blanc,  and  her 
face  was  still  suffused  with  blushes,  as  we  rode  into  the  yard  of  the  hotel, 
tired  and  hungry,  but  well  satisfied  with  our  day's  work  in  the  Alps." 

The  companionship  of  President  Allen  on  such  a  day,  and 
the  sharing  of  such  experiences  with  him,  remains  one  of  the 
bright  pictures  in  a  series  of  undimmed  memories. 

The  Club  entered  Italy  by  the  Mount  Cenis  tunnel,  visited 
Milan,  Genoa,  Pisa,  Rome,  Naples,  Florence,  Venice,  Milan 
again,  and  returned  to  Southern  Switzerland  by  the  wonderful 
St.  Gothard  tunnel,  a  few  days  after  it  was  first  opened.  It  is 
impossible  to  say  what  is  enjoyed  most  in  a  land  which  is  so 
beautiful,  and  where  everything  is  so  inwoven  with  the  world's 
history,  poetry,  and  destiny.  In  Italy,  if  anywhere,  Prex  was 
at  his  best.  Rome,  around  which  so  much  of  the  world's  his- 
tory has  centered  for  more  than  a  score  of  centuries,  is  an  inex- 
haustible mine,' which  the  Club  worked  diligently,  and  from 
which  the  president  brought  many  things  that  now  enrich  his 
monument,  the  Steinheim,  where  his  treasures  and  his  ashes 
rest  together. 

UP    VESUVIUS. 

Some  experiences  at  Mount  Vesuvius  brought  an  accident  to 
the  president,  and  great  anxiety  to  the  Club;  but  his  strength 
of  body  and  character  shone  through  this  misfortune,  like  the 
sun  breaking  through  the  clouds  of  a  vanquished  storm;  as 
the  story  runs  on  the  reader  will  see  how  much  reason  for  anx- 
iety, and  how  much  cause  for  gratitude  because  of  the  final  out- 
come of  that  which  was  at  the  time  so  threatening.  One  of  the 
Club  wrote  of  the  accident  in  the  following  words: — 

"On  the  24th  of  July,  1882,  we  left  Rome  at  6  a.  m.  for  Naples,  and 
reached  there  in  time  to  visit  the  reopened  grave  of  Pompeii,  with  its 
story  of  rude  magnificence,  semi-barbaric  splendor,  and  not-to-be-told 
moral  degradation.  As  we  came  back  to  Naples  in  the  early  evening, 
Vesuvius  put  on  a  crown  of  fire,  and  showed  a  stream  of  lava,  which, 
like  a  thread  of  arterial  blood,  crept  down  the  side  of  the  cone  toward 
Pompeii.  We  retired  early,  to  be  called  at  2:30  a.  m.,  for  the  ascent  of 
Vesuvius.     The    'being    called'    was    an    unnecessary  precaution.     Our 


142  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

rooms  were  on  the  ground  floor  of  the  new  '  Hotel  Vesuvius,'  on  the 
shore  of  the  bay,  and  at  a  point  where  our  disturbed  slumbers  dreamed 
that  all  forms  of  Neapolitan  life  combined  to  make  all  forms  of  sound 
that  human  tongues  or  donkeys'  throats  could  fashion,  throughout  the 
livelong  night.  These  dreams  were  so  real  that  we  lay  awake  waiting 
to  be  called,  and  were  glad  to  get  out  into  the  cool  starlight  of  the  early 
morning,  and  be  off  at  3  o'clock.  We  drove  for  three  miles  before  we 
were  out  of  the  city,  most  of  the  way  along  the  shore  of  the  bay.  By 
this  time  we  were  beginning  to  climb  the  slope  of  the  mountain.  For 
two  or  three  miles  the  hillside  is  covered  with  vineyards  and  gardens, 
with  fig  and  other  fruit  trees  closely  set.  The  richest  fruits  grow  on  the 
lava-covered  sides,  where  time  has  pulverized  and  cultivation  has  deep- 
ened and  enriched  the  soil.  As  we  rise,  the  gardens  recede,  the  well- 
kept  road  zigzags  by  sharper  and  shorter  turns,  until  we  are  on  the  bare 
waste  of  lava.  It  is  piled  above,  around,  below,  in  all  fantastic  shapes, 
just  as  it  cooled.  Where  we  are  now  for  some  thousands  of  acres  we 
see  the  results  of  the  eruption  of  1872.  It  is  as  devoid  of  life  as  the 
heart  of  the  African  desert — a  great  sea  of  molten  desolation,  transfixed 
when  all  its  waves  and  currents  were  at  war,  and  yet  so  full  of  latent 
motion  that  the  whole  mountain  side  seems  ready  to  start  again,  and  you 
involuntarily  hold  your  breath  at  some  sharp  turn,  lest  the  grinding  of 
the  slow-climbing  wheels  of  the  carriage  set  it  flowing  again,  and  sweep 
you  away.  At  7  o'clock  we  reach  the  foot  of  the  cone,  and  the  railroad, 
eleven  miles  from  our  hotel.  This  railroad  is  a  modern  affair,  which  saves 
the  fatigue  of  the  last  mile  of  the  ascent;  and  a  few  hours  later  we  found 
great  reason  to  be  thankful  for  its  existence.  It  runs  by  an  endless 
chain  and  stationary  engine  at  the  base  of  the  cone.  The  angle  of  ascent 
is  about  thirty  degrees,  or  one  foot  rise  for  each  two  traversed.  The  car 
is  wide  enough  for  two  on  a  seat,  and,  sitting  and  standing,  will  contain 
about  a  dozen  persons.  The  sides  are  open,  and  only  a  light  arm  rail  at 
the  end  of  the  seat  is  between  the  passenger  and  the  abyss.  The  car 
climbs  as  if  by  "  hitches,"  and  seems  so  weary  at  times  that  you  shrink  into 
your  seat,  for  fear  it  will  collapse  and  all  go  to  instantaneous  ruin.  If 
there  were  trees  or  aught  else  along  the  way  to  hide  the  scene  a  little,  it 
would  be  better  for  uneasy  nerves.  You  see  the  tracks  underneath,  the 
cables  alongside,  the  station  overhead  as  you  look  up,  or  below  as  you 
look  down;  all  else  is  ashes,  lava,  sky.  People  with  weak  nerves  can 
easily  find  places  where  they  will  be  happier.  It  is  too  early  for  break- 
fast with  these  leisurely  Italians  at  the  little  restaurant,  so  we  order  it  to 
be  ready  an  hour  and  a  half  later,  mount  the  car,  and  go  up. 


VACATION  TOUR  IN  EUROPE.  1 43 

"From  the  upper  station  a  zigzag  path  leads  to  the  '  old  crater,'  in 
about  twenty  minutes.  Look  down.  We  are  far,  far  above  the  clouds, 
which  cover  half  the  city  and  the  widespreading  plain  below.  The 
waters  of  the  bay  blend  with  the  clouds  until  the  ships  appear  absolutely  to 
sail  in  the  heavens.  The  surroundings  make  one's  nerves  tingle,  and  the 
undertone  of  excitement  becomes  exultation  as  we  stand  and  take  breath, 
four  thousand  feet  above  the  water  below.  There  are  no  expletives  to  do 
the  scene  ju.stice,  in  words  ;  we  admire  and  adore  in  joyous  silence. 

"From  this  point  each  man  must  have  a  guide  to  'pull  him '  over  the 
line  of  loose  ashes  and  rough  lava,  between  us  and  the  dead  crater.  It 
is  impossible  to  describe  the  top  of  Vesuvius  so  as  to  give  a  complete 
idea  to  one  who  has  not  seen  it.  The  lowlands  and  ordinary  moun- 
tains furnish  nothing  analogous.  It  will  approach  a  description  to  .sa}- 
that  the  old  crater  is  like  a  caldron  kettle  holding  several  acres  of 
molten  iron,  cooled  in  an  instant,  just  when  it  was  boiling  and  bubbling 
into  .miniature  mountains  and  whirlpools,  crusted  so  that  you  can  cross 
it,  taking  care  to  avoid  holes  and  cracks,  from  which  steam  and  smoke 
and  sulphuric  gas  spurt  and  fizz  as  though  the  fires  under  the  kettle 
were  very  far  from  being  extinguished;  over  all  is  a  thick  incrustation 
of  sulphur.  Across  and  up  we  go  toward  the  new  and  active  crater.  If 
it  be  difficult  to  describe  the  old  crater,  it  is  doubly  so  to  paint  the  active 
one  in  words.  We  now  stand  on  the  outer  rim,  the  narrow,  crumbling 
edge  of  a  great,  irregular  basin,  too  narrow  to  walk  on  except  in  single 
file.  Sloping  inward  precipitously  for  a  hundred  and  fifty  feet,  and  then 
rising  sharply  fifty  feet  or  more,  lies  the  path  to  the  rim  of  the  second 
basin,  from  where  you  look  directly  into  the  hot  heart  of  the  mountain, 
from  whence  the  steam  and  smoke  ascend  with  continuous  roar  like  the 
voice  of  twenty  Niagaras.  Every  few  minutes — sometimes  seconds  only 
— sharp  explosions  take  place,  flinging  stones  and  lava  high  above  the 
rim  of  the  crater,  and  often  above  the  column  of  smoke. 

"'Shall  we  go  down?' — 'Yes.'  The  sides  are  too  steep  for  walking 
and  too  loose  for  climbing.  The  moment  you  step  over  the  rim  every- 
thing begins  to  slide — sulphur,  ashes,  lava,  guides,  travelers,  in  one  grand 
avalanche.  Thus  we  go,  four  travelers,  four  special  guides,  one  general 
guide,  and  four  or  five  boys  who  are  bound  to  turn  an  honest  franc  by 
rushing  over  the  edge  of  the  second  rim  to  put  a  penny  into  the  soft 
lava  and  bring  it  back  thus  imbedded,  for  a  keepsake.  Under  the  loose 
lava  and  amid  the  ashes  lurk  ten  thousand  jets  of  sulphuric  gas,  waiting 
to  rush  into  the  faces  of  those  who  dare  to  invade  this  vestibule  of  hades. 
By  the  time  you  have  reached  the  rim  of  the  inner  basin,  you  are  glad  to 


144  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

breathe  through  the  folds  of  your  handkerchief,  held  closely  over  the 
nose,  as  the  only  means  of  avoiding  suffocation.  Vesuvius  seemed  dis- 
turbed by  our  coming,  for  scarcely  had  we  gained  the  inner  rim,  where 
all  below  us  was  too  hot  and  fresh  to  be  incrusted  with  sulphur,  and  was 
black  as  the  heart  of  an  encaverned  midnight,  when  he  shouted  to  the 
hidden  artillerymen,  and  up  came  two  or  three  shots  in  quick  succession, 
the  blotches  of  red  lava  falling  around,  some  at  our  own  feet,  we  dodging 
like  playful  children  under  a  shower  of  apples  from  shaken  boughs. 
The  boys  rush  over  the  edge  and  deposit  the  pennies,  bringing  the  lava 
back  on  the  end  of  a  stick;  the  wind  veers  a  little;  the  cloud  of  smoke 
and  sulphurous  gas  from  the  crater  threatens  to  envelop  us.  Such  an 
embrace  means  quick  suffocation.  The  chief  guide  cries,  '  Hurry! 
hurry!'  and  we  rush,  pulled,  pushed,  climbing,  jumping,  going,  no  one 
knows  how,  until  we  stand  again  on  the  outer  rim,  where  a  breath  of 
pure  air  from  below  clears  the  vapors,  and  we  stand,  panting  and  exultant. 

HOW  THE  REST  HAPPENED. 

'"Shall  we  go  over  on  the  other  side  and  see  the  flowing  lava?'  'Is 
it  far?'  'Fifteen  minutes  to  go  down  to  the  point  where  we  can  reach 
the  stream,  and  forty-five  to  climb  back.'  'All  right.'  On  the  steep 
sides  of  Vesuvius  one  can  go  down  hundreds  of  feet  in  a  brief  period. 
We  went  in  the  face  of  an  Italian  sunshine,  and  found  the  heat  intense. 
The  outer  edge  of  the  lava  stream  was  cool  enough  to  walk  on,  but  not 
to  stand  still  on.  It  warmed  through  the  soles  of  one's  shoes  as  though 
they  were  pasteboard.  It  was  irregular,  rough-edged,  cooled,  and  cool- 
ing in  all  fantastic  shapes.  It  lay  in  ridges  and  lapped  over  in  cornice- 
like edges,  as  snowdrifts  do.  It  was  full  of  chasms  and  caves.  Only  the 
'general  guide'  is  now  with  us;  he  leads.  Parson,  being  the  heaviest  of 
the  Club — avoirdupois — lingers  a  little.  It  cracks  under  his  weight;  all 
have  stopped  to  catch  breath,  and  the  guide  is  shouting  to  his  fellows, 
who  are  partly  down  the  pass,  waiting  for  an  extra  dollar  for  pulling  us 
back  to  the  summit.  Full  of  scientific  enthusiasm,  Prex  has  pressed  to 
the  farthest  point  reached  by  the  guide,  for  one  more  look,  and  for  a  mo- 
ment is  out  of  sight  behind  a  great  wart  of  lava.  A  subdued  'hallo'  is 
heard,  and  he  appears,  hat  in  hand,  his  head  and  face  streaming  with 
blood.  We  are  all  at  his  side  instantly.  The  story  is  brief  The  lava 
broke  as  he  attempted  to  spring  across  a  chasm;  his  hands  were  full  of 
specimens;  he  plunged  forward,  striking  the  sharp  ridge  of  the  freshly- 
cooled  lava;  the  sharper  points  penetrated  his  thick  felt  hat,  and  the 
knife-like  edge  of  lava  cut  an   ugly  gash  four  and  onc-Jialf  inches  long 


'^  <9 


^    tEV.A.ll.LEWL\D.Jj,     f.  ' 


5f;?e  "  QrafT)  Qub." 


VACATION  TOUR  IN  EUROPE.  I  4.5 

across  the  left  side  of  his  head,  the  skull  showing  at  the  deepest  point. 
A  hasty  examination  shows  the  skull  to  be  sound,  and  no  large  arteries 
severed.  It  bleeds  profusely.  We  bind  it  with  three  handkerchiefs, 
shout  to  a  boy  to  go  for  water,  call  the  waiting  guides,  and  prepare  for 
what  seems  the  best  thing,  to  retrace  our  steps.  The  climb  is  by  far  the 
hardest  of  the  day.  Two  strong  guides  take  charge  of  the  wounded 
Prex,  and  two  more  of  Press,  who,  having  once  been  the  victim  of  a 
Severe  sunstroke,  now  shows  strong  symptoms  of  yielding  again  to  the 
heat,  which  is  terrific,  coupled  with  sulphuric  gas.  Pundit  and  Parson 
each  have  a  guide,  and  so  we  commence  to  climb,  the  wounded  man 
ahead,  his  guides  enjoined  to  go  slow,  and  let  him  rest  often,  for  we  fear 
excessive  hemorrhage.  He  is  brave,  and  climbs  as  eagerly  now  as  before 
he  sought  the  dangerous  spoils.  Part  of  the  way  up  Press  yields  still 
more  to  the  fierce  heat,  and  unfavorable  symptoms  increase.  His  guides 
lift  him  to  their  shoulders  for  a  while,  a  favorable  reaction  takes  place, 
and  he  takes  his  feet  again.  Just  how,  or  in  how  long  a  time,  we  made 
the  ascent,  the  writer  does  not  know.  Under  God's  blessing  it  was 
accomplished.  The  mountain  top  brought  freedom  from  the  excessive 
heat  and  stifling  vapors,  and  at  the  railroad  a  bucket  of  water  reached  us. 
After  resting,  and  bathing  the  wounded  and  sun-stricken  heads,  we  made 
the  descent.  Here  was  a  new  trouble:  The  military  police,  who  repre- 
sent the  government,  fearing  still  worse  results,  urged  our  immediate 
departure  for  Naples.  We  urged  rest  for  the  patients,  and  breakfast.  At 
last  they  granted  twenty  minutes.  We  took  enough,  without  consulting 
our  watches,  for  rest,  some  coffee,  and  a  little  food.  These  brought  favor- 
able results  to  all  the  Club,  and  before  we  reached  Naples  both  Prex  and 
Press  were  'maist  as  weel  as  new.'  The  wounded  man  insisted  that  the 
Club  should  'treat  the  case,'  and  by  3  p.  m.  we  had  the  wound  dressed, 
and  the  patient  '  resting  nicely.' 

"At  9  o'clock  that  night  four  weary  men  leaned  back  in  the  four  cor- 
•ners  of  a  'first-class  compartment'  on  the  night  train  for  Rome,  and  four 
grateful  hearts  gave  thanks  unto  Him  who  watcheth  over  his  children, 
and  gives  unseen  protection  in  the  hour  of  danger. 

"Thus  we  saw  Vesuvius." 

The  calmness  of  soul,  the  steadiness  of  nerve,  and  the 
absence  of  all  complaint,  marked  the  noble  manliness  of  President 
Allen  under  these  trying  circumstances,  as  few  other  things 
could  have  done.  A  fev^^  days  afterward  he  said:  "If  I  had 
found  that  I  was  fatally  hurt,  I  intended  to  ask  you  to  cremate 


146  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

me  there.  I  believe  in  cremation.  It  was  but  a  little  way  below 
there  that  Byron  cremated  Shelley,  and  it  would  have  been  far 
better  than  to  have  taken  my  body  home."  This  was  said  as 
quietly  as  a  child  would  speak  of  his  playthings.  But  a  far 
pleasanter  incident  has  come  to  the  knowledge  of  the  writer. 
Some  time  after  his  return  from  Europe,  on  a  given  Sabbath 
morning,  President  Allen  preached  a  wonderful  sermon  on 
"spiritual  transfiguration."  Those  who  heard  it  seemed  to  listen 
to  one  who  had  been  on  the  "holy  mount"  and  talked  with 
God.  When  asked  whence  came  the  inspiration  out  of  which 
the  sermon  grew,  he  said,  "My  experience  at  Vesuvius."  The 
writer  can  understand  what  he  meant,  for  when  we  had  made 
that  terrible  ascent,  after  he  was  hurt,  and  stood  looking  out  on 
the  blue  bay  of  Naples,  with  its  white-winged  ships,  while  the 
cool  breath  fanned  his  feverish,  blood-stained  face,  it  was 
indeed  the  mount  of  redemption  and  of  transfiguration.  And, 
oh,  how  his  redeemed  spirit  must  now  rejoice  in  the  blessed 
realities  of  the  spiritual  glory  of  which  that  scene  was  a  faint 
picture! 

Space  fails,  and  the  rest  of  the  delightful  journey  must 
remain  unwritten  here.  The  Club  returned  to  Rome,  went  to 
Florence,  and  then  to  Venice,  beautiful,  restful,  noiseless  Venice, 
whose  liquid  streets  rise  and  fall  with  the  heart  throbs  of  the 
Adriatic  Sea,  and  lull  wearied  travelers  like  the  whispered  lullaby 
of  mother's  lips.  While  we  rested  here,  and  just  when  we  knew 
the  wounded  head  needed  special  care.  Dr.  Daniel  Lewis,  a 
loyal  alumnus  of  the  University,  appeared  on  the  scene.  He 
dressed  the  wound,  and  assured  us  that  it  was  "doing  finely," 
and  so  helped  to  lift  the  only  shadow  that  drifted  across  the 
horizon  of  that  summer  of  rest.  Leaving  Italy  the  Club  visited 
Southern  Switzerland,  Luzerne  lake  and  city,  Mount  Riga, 
Basle,  Baden-Baden,  Coblentz,  Wiesbaden,  Ems,  Mayence, 
Heidelburg,  Cologne,  Dusseldorf,  Frankfort,  Amsterdam,  Haar- 
lem, Rotterdam,  Hague,  and  back  to  London,  to  Liverpool,  and 
Chester,  and  at  length  home. 

It  is  more  than  eleven  years  since  we  sailed  on  that  bright  June 


VACATION    TOUR    IN    EUROPE.  1 47 

day,  returning  when  autumn  was  ripe  and  golden.  The  scenes 
and  experiences  of  that  deHghtful  summer  He  in  the  sunlight  of 
memory,  as  the  purple  hills  lie  in  the  golden  haze  of  a  declining 
September  afternoon.  Lingering  in  all  the  memories,  and  mak- 
ing-an  integral  and  important  part  of  them,  is  Prex,  genial, 
gentlemanly,  unselfish,  enriching  by  his  culture,  enhancing  by 
his  nobleness,  and  sanctifying  by  his  religious  faith,  all  places  and 
all  experiences.  He  has  taken  the  final  homeward  journey 
first,  and  while  we  wait,  Press,  Pundit,*  and  Parson  unite  to 
bring  this  grateful  tribute  to  the  memory  of  him  whom  one 
could  not  know  as  we  knew  him  without  enshrining  him  among 
the  best  of  earthly  friends. 


*Since  this  was  written,  ''Pundit,"  too,  has  finished  life's  journey,  to  meet  the 
fast-gathering  company  of  redeemed  ones. 


GliAPTER    XUIII. 

LITERARY    SOCIETIES    AND    LIBRARY. 

THE    FOUR    LYCEUMS. 

^  I  HE  general  unrest  that  comes  into  all  student  life  was 
JL  especially  apparent  in  attempts  to  form  new  associations 
or  societies.  As  the  years  went  on,  the  Franklin  Lyceum 
came  to  be  the  especial  organ  for  the  older  students,  thus  giv- 
ing the  younger  members  very  little  opportunity  for  the  improve- 
ment it  offered.  On  this  account  the  "Rough  and  Ready" 
society  was  formed,  where  at  each  meeting  all  the  members 
were  expected  to  take  part,  whether  they  were  specially  prepared 
or  not.  The  Platonic  and  Amphyctionic  societies  grew  from 
the  desire  of  those  in  the  Greek  and  Latin  classes  to  give  more 
attention  to  classical  literature,  history,  philosophy,  and  law. 
For  a  time  there  was  an  effort,  though  unsuccessful,  to  unite  all 
these  interests  into  the  Theological  and  Dedaskalian  or  Teachers' 
association — which  it  was  thought  would  meet  the  demands  of 
all  classes.  These  were  to  give  equal  opportunities  to  both 
sexes.  They  all  flourished  for  a  time,  but  aft;erward  split  up 
into  branches,  out  of  which  have  grown  the  four  lyceums  that 
have  for  many  years  maintained  their  individuality,  and  afforded 
opportunities  for  growth  and  improvement  to  by  far  the  greater 
number  of  those  who  have  come  to  Alfred. 

The  "Orophilian"- — lover  of  oratory — was  formed  in  1850, 
the  members  coming  mostly  from  the  "Amphyctionics."  It 
adopted  ''Eloqiientia  Mundnm  Regif  for  its  motto,  as  being 
the  most  expressive  of  the  design  in  its  organization.  Professor 
W.  R.  Prentice  says  "that  in  founding  the  society  they  builded 

(148) 


LITERARY    SOCIETIES     AND    LIHRARV.  1 49 

better  than  they  knew.  Their  object  was  to  secure  better 
advantages  in  learning  the  art  of  public  speaking.  They 
founded  a  society  which  has  kept  on  making  public  speakers 
down  through  the  years." 

The  "Alleghanian" — Head  of  the  Mighty  was  formed  in 
185  I.  It  has  proved,  as  its  members  hoped,  a  prophecy,  since 
from  its  small  beginning  it  has  become  a  m;ghty  stream  in  its 
educating  influence.  Its  motto  is  '" Perseverantia  Omnia  Vin- 
citr 

After  the  first  ladies'  society,  the  "Alphadelphian,"  had  lost 
itself  in  the  other  co-working  associations,  a  new  sjciety  was 
formed,  in  1850,  called  the  "  Ladies'  Literary."  Mrs.  Professor 
Marvin,  then  preceptress,  was  its  first  president.  In  1864  it 
took  the  name  "Alfriedian,"  with  the  motto  "Excelsior,"  a  true 
index  of  its  long,  vigorous,  and  still  active  work. 

The  "Ladies'  Athenaeum,"  afterwards  "Athenasan,"  was  or- 
ganized in  1859.  \\.svi\o\.\.o  xs,"' La  Sagesse  soutient  U Universe 
Of  its  early  history  May  Allen  Champlin  says:  "This  new  lyceum 
was  very  kindly  received  by  the  older  ones,  the  'Ladies'  Liter- 
ary' sending  delegates  and  the  'Alleghanian'  and  'Orophilian' 
both  passing  resolutions  to  receive  its  members  as  sisters.  As 
a  lyceum  it  has  been  equal  to  any  other  in  generosity  as  well  as 
in  literary  merit." 

SESSION  ROOMS  AND  PUBLIC    ENTERTAINMENTS. 

These  four  lyceums  long  since  became  permanent  institu- 
tions of  the  University,  all  holding  their  regular  weekly  sessions 
during  the  school  year.  The  gentlemen  have  occupied  rooms 
in  Chapel  Hall,  while  the  Ladies'  Boarding  Hall  has  provided 
those  for  the  young  ladies.  These  rooms  have  all  been  nicely  fur- 
nished by  their  respective  societies,  and  are  provided  with  mu- 
sical instruments  and  libraries.  For  many  years  the  membership 
in  the  four  lyceums  has  averaged  about  the  same  in  numbers. 

Near  the  holiday  time  in  winter,  and  at  the  close  of  the 
spring  term,  each  society  has  given  a  public  entertainment. 
Often  at  these  times  the  older  members  have  been   recalled  to 


150  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 


& 


give  addresses  or  other  assistance.  Naturally  there  has  been 
much  pleasant  rivalry  on  these  occasions,  and  seldom  has  it 
occurred  that  any  one  society  has  felt  to  have  fallen  below  the 
others  in  their  public  sessions.  I  am  glad  to  say  that  no  secret 
organization  has  ever  obtained  a  foothold  in  the  University. 

THE  SECRET  OF   HIS   INFLUENCE. 

During  the  many  years  that  the  metaphysics  and  general  train- 
ing for  the  senior  year  came  under  Dr.  Allen's  care,  he  often  had 
from  nine  to  ten  classes  in  a  day;  this  was  severe,  yet  he  was 
equal  to  the  task.  The  morning  hours  before  chapel  were  pre- 
ferred for  elocution,  and  the  last  hours  in  the  afternoon  for 
geology  or  botany,  as  this  gave  more  time  for  field  work.  His 
evening  classes  were  open  to  citizens.  These  were  often  held 
in  the  home,  where  ancient  history,  Chaucer,  and  Shakespeare 
were  favorite  subjects  for  consideration.  These  classes,  though 
beginning  with  a  small  number,  often  increased  till  it  would  be 
difficult  to  find  seats  for  all. 

Dr.  D.  R.  Ford,  of  Elmira,  Dr.  Allen's  lifelong  friend  and 
co-worker,  expressed  the  thought  at  the  memorial  service  that 
the  secret  of  his  wonderful  power  and  influence,  and  the  incalcu- 
lable benefit  he  had  been  to  the  students  of  Alfred  University, 
were  rendered  possible  only  by  his  tact  and  originality  in  the 
art  of  organizing.  This  faculty  was  exemplified  in  the  assist- 
ance he  was  constantly  giving  to  the  different  organizations  as 
they  were  developed  by  the  growth  of  the  institution  in  its  dif- 
ferent branches. 

ALUMNI     MEETINGS. 

The  Alumni  Association,  though  it  had  long  held  regular 
meetings  at  commencement  time,  was  organized  in  1886  at  the 
semi-centennial  meeting  of  the  University.  Judge  S.  O. 
Thatcher,  of  the  Supreme  Court  of  Kansas,  was  chosen  its  pres- 
ident. This  office  has  been  held  by  Dr.  Daniel  Lewis,  of  New 
York,  Judge  P.  B.  McLennan,  Judge  S.  M.  Dexter,  of  Elmira, 
and  Hon.  W.  W.  Brown,  of  Bradford,  Pa. 


LITERARY    SOCIETIES    AND    LIBRARY.  I5I 

THE    LIBRARY. 

For  increased  efficiency,  the  theological  library  and  those  of 
the  four  literary  societies  were,  with  the  University  library, 
consolidated  at  the  first  meeting  of  the  Alumni  Association. 
Since  that  time  the  private  libraries  of  Professor  Larkin  and 
President  Allen  have  been  added  to  these,  and  the  main  room 
on  the  second  floor  of  Kenyon  Memorial  Hall  has  been  fitted 
up  for  a  general  library  and  reading  room.  It  is  all  indexed 
and  catalogued  on  the  "Dewey  system, "and  is  open  to  students 
and  teachers  every  school  day  in  the  week. 

Mrs.  L.  T.  Stanton  writes  of  the  library: — 

"Were  it  possible  to  give  a  vivid  word  picture  of  Alfred  University- 
library  in  1891-92,  it  would  be  another  illustrative  instance  of  the  per- 
sonal element  in  the  character  of  President  Allen,  that  made  his  hfe  like 
a  benediction  to  multitudes  of  young  people.  You  would  see  the  bright 
room,  with  its  great  windows  overlooking  the  beautiful  hills  and  valleys, 
the  cases  filled  with  books,  in  which  are  the  life  thoughts  of  the  best 
minds  of  all  ages,  the  long  tables  around  which  the  students  gather  for 
quiet  study,  while  the  quick  ticking  of  the  clock  tells  off  the  passing 
hours.  The  chapel  bell  rings,  the  third  recitation  hour  is  at  an  end.  In 
a  few  minutes  the  doors  of  the  librar}-  open  and  the  senior  class  of  '92, 
bright,  eager,  full  of  joyous  earnestness,  enters,  followed  by  the  grand, 
courtly  form  of  President  Allen.  How  they  crowd  around  him,  won  by 
that  genial,  buoyant  nature,  that  always  had  time  to  give  himself,  and 
whose  very  presence  added  new  value  to  everything!  Eager  questions 
w^ere  asked  by  the  scholarly  man,  who  was  equally  at  home  in  science, 
art,  literature,  logic,  philosophy,  and  theology. 

"His  mental  movements  were  clear  and  rapid,  and  all  felt  that  behind 
his  unconsciousness  of  self  was  the  hiding  of  great  power.  Passing  from 
case  to  case,  familiar  with  all  the  books,  and  reading  intuitively  the  minds 
of  others,  he  was  ready  to  advise  or  direct  each  one  to  the  needed  source 
of  knowledge.  By  his  words  of  shrewd  wit,  humor,  or  wisdom,  he  awak- 
ened and  stimulated  their  minds,  until  their  faces  shone  with  the  joy  of 
mental  activity. 

"There    was  always  the  most  eager  yet  friendly  rivalry  among  the  , 
seniors  in  their  quest  for  books  relating  to  their  college  work.      Some- 
times an  hour  or  more  would  thus  be  spent  in  the  library,  until  one  after 
another  of  the  class,  having  secured  their  desired  help,  would  go  out,  and 


b 


152  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

then  President    Allen   would  settle  down  for  a  little  quiet  research   or 
recreation  for  himself  among  the  books  or  late  periodicals. 

"Not  to  the  senior  class  alone,  but  to  all  students  of  the  University, 
this  care-encumbered  man  gave  his  time,  and  that  rarer  gift,  inspiring 
power.  They  went  out  from  his  presence  feeling  that  such  a  manhood 
was  a  royal  gift;  and,  thrilled  with  the  impulse  to  a  nobler  life  thus  exem- 
plified, many  were  vitalized  with  a  power  that  determined  the  develop- 
ment and  fruitage  of  their  after  lives.  Such  a  whole-hearted  admiration 
of  a  noble  Christian  man  is  the  richest  influence  that  can  come  into  a 
young  life." 


GliAPTER    XIX. 

THE    WESTERN    TRIP    IN    1891. 

THE     START. 

^1%  /I"^-  ALLEN  had  quite  given  up  the  idea  of  visiting 
i  ^  I  our  own  wonderlands  in  the  great  West,  as  he  had 
V^^  never  seen  his  way  clear  for  such  a  journey.  How- 
ever, this  desire  was  gratified  in  1891,  when  Judge  and  Mrs.  N. 
M..  Hubbard,  of  Cedar  Rapids,  Iowa,  made  us  their  guests  for 
the  summer  vacation  of  that  year.  Taking  us  via  the  Central 
Pacific  Railroad  over  the  Rockies,  thence  on  to  the  sea,  we 
returned  by  the  Northern  Pacific  down  the  lakes  from  Duluth, 
through  Canada,  and  back  to  old  Allegany. 

Our  college  campus  never  looked  more  inviting  than  on 
that  early  morning  when  we  rode  out  under  the  elms,  all  jew- 
eled with  dew,  on  our  way  to  the  train  that  was  to  take  us  west- 
ward. Just  before  reaching  Chicago  the  Judge  met  us,  and, 
smiling  from  under  his  new  summer  hat,  took  our  checks  and 
ourselves  in  charge.  "From  that  hour,"  Mr.  Allen  remarked, 
"we  had  no  more  responsibility  than  women  or  children."  Break- 
fasting the  next  morning  at  Cedar  Rapids  with  the.  family,  we 
rested  for  a  week  preparatory  to  taking  the  further  journey, 
meanwhile  making  a  short  visit  to  friends  in  Austin,  Minnesota. 
Judge  and  Mrs.  Hubbard  and  our  two  selves  were  to  form  the 
quiet  traveling  party,  which  they  had  spared  no  pains  in  arrang- 
ing for  before  our  arrival.  Looking  back  it  seems  as  though 
no  other  number  of  weeks  could  count  as  many  days  of  sun- 
shine as  those  that  greeted-us  on  that  journey.  Our  beautiful 
car,  with  all  its  modern  '  improvements  for  comfort  and    rest, 

(  -53) 


154  LIFE    OF     PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

would  let  US  go  to  sleep  in  one  State  and  awake  the  next  morn- 
ing in  another,  as  we  sped  onward  over  the  great  plains.  Day 
by  day  the  bright  sunshine  lent  its  charm  in  bringing  out  the 
lights  and  shadows  over  boundless  plain,  distant  mountain, 
fathomless  cafion,   or  overhanging  rocks. 

It  was  planned  to  reach  the  Columbia  River  just  at  daylight, 
so  as  to  have  the  journey  by  boat  during  the  daytime.  As  we 
sailed  down  that  queen  of  rivers,  we  felt  that  writers,  poets,  and 
artists  have  all  failed  to  paint  its  grandeur  and  beauty.  Every- 
where basaltic  columns  rose  up  hundreds  of  feet  from  the  midst  of 
the  water,  as  though  Vulcan  in  his  anger  had  thrown  out  some 
great  thunderbolt  in  defying  man's  attempts  to  utilize  nature. 
Here  and  there  the  great  basaltic  walls  lining  the  banks  would 
melt  away  to  rich  alluvial  land,  that  must  be  tempting  to  the 
pioneer. 

All  too  soon  we  reached  Portland,  Oregon.  It  was  surpris- 
ing to  find  here,  as  well  as  in  other  cities  of  the  Pacific  Coast, 
all  the  modern  improvements  in  street  cars,  buildings,  etc.,  often 
carried  to  much  greater  perfection  than  even  in  our  old  Eastern 
cities.  Electric  or  cable  cars  seemed  largely  to  have  taken  the 
place  of  the  ordinary  horse  cars.  These  would  mount  up  the 
high  bluffs  with  as  much  ease  as  though  going  on  level  ground- 
Often  a  ride  on  these  cars  to  the  end  of  their  routes  and  return 
would  give  a  better  idea  of  the  cities  than  by  going  in  any  other 
way. 

Tacoma  and  Seattle  are  built  in  terraces  into  the  sides  of 
the  bluffs,  so  that  sometimes  from  the  second  story  you  could 
go  out  into  one  street,  and  from  the  lower  story,  into  the  one 
below.  Here  we  found  sister  Emeline  Allen  Wood — one  of 
the  "little  sisters" — who  was  now  a  grandmother  with  silver  hair. 
We  had  not  seen  her  for  many  a  year,  but  felt  that  the  heart 
welcome  was  as  tender  and  fresh  as  though  we  had  parted  but 
yesterday.  P>om  her  front  steps  could  be  seen  old  Tacoma, 
whose  giant  face  looked  into  ours,  till  it  seemed  that  with  arms 
but  a  little  longer  we  could  shake  hands  with  the  giant  himself. 
And  vet  the  mountain  was  more  than  sixty  miles  away. 


THE    WESTERN    TRIP    IX     1 89 1.  155 

At  Seattle  our  stay  was  delightful.  Here  we  met  lawyer 
Frank  Steel,  one  of  our  old  student  boys  of  many  years  before. 
A  drive  around  Victoria  made  us  feel  that  we  must  certainly  be 
on  the  rocky  coast  of  New  England,  so  alike  are  they  in  general 
appearance  and  geological  formation. 

A    WEEK    TN    THE    NATIONAL    PARK. 

The  Northern  Pacific  brought  us  to  Livingston,  from 
whence  our  steps  were  directed  toward  the  great  National 
Park.  Here  a  week  was  spent,  with  new  surprises  awaiting  us 
each  day.  You  may  have  read  many  a  description  of  this  glori- 
ous part  of  our  country,  but  should  the  English  and  all  other 
languages  be  exhausted  in  trying  to  give  descriptive  pictures, 
only  a  faint  shadow  of  the  truth  could  be  revealed. 

Leaving  Livingston  on  the  train  that  would  take  us  to  Cin- 
nabar, twenty  miles  distant,  we  journeyed  by  stage  the  remain- 
ing nine  miles  to  the  Mammoth  Hot  Springs.  Here,  before 
entering  the  Park,  our  dear  Mrs.  Hubbard  was  prostrated  by 
mountain  fever,  so  we  were  obliged  to  forego  the  society  of  our 
friends  the  rest  of  the  journey. 

It  is  not  strange-  that  the  magnificent  region  of  the  park 
should  so  long  have  been  unknown,  except  to  the  Indians  and 
a  few  bold  adventurers,  for,  being  in  a  valley  of  such  altitude,  it 
is  inaccessible,  on  account  of  snow,  only  for  a  few  of  the  summer 
months.  It  is  surrounded  by  snow-clad  mountains,  full  of 
impassable  canons,  much  of  it  being  covered  with  the  primeval 
forests  of  gigantic  pines.  It  is  crowded  with  rushing,  sulphur- 
ous vapors,  rising  constantly  here  and  there  and  everywhere, 
and  so  strangely  bursting  upon  the  unwary  traveler  that  it  is  no 
wonder  it  seemed  to  the  untutored  savage  the  very  gateway  to 
the  abode  of  evil  spirits.  Three  miles  from  the  Mammoth  Hot 
Springs  the  golden  gate  to  the  park  is  entered.  Here  the 
government  has  spent  thousands  upon  blasting  a  driveway 
through  the  solid  rock,  yet  we  must  crowd  against  the  pre- 
cipitous wall  or  feel  that  we  were  to  be  plunged  into  the  raging 
torrent  below. 


156  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

A  few  miles  further  on  and  we  are  at  Glass  Mountain,  where 
even  the  roadway  is  made  of  precious  obsidian. 

At  Beaver  Lake  we  caught  our  first  sight  of  those  interest- 
ing, artistic  little  builders  from  which  the  lake  is  named.  Being 
so  well  protected  by  law,  they  seemed  to  have  quite  lost  their 
fear  of  man. 

Riding  on  we  saw  now  and  then  the  rising  mist  from  some 
distant  geyser,  but  no  true  idea  of  one  was  gained  till  we 
reached  Norris  Basin.  Here  we  thought  them  wonderful,  but 
on  our  return  saw  how  insignificant  they  were,  compared  to 
those  we  had  then  seen. 

At  Grand  Caiion — the  Niagara  of  the  Yellowstone — the  river 
leaps  hundreds  of  feet  into  an  abyss  that  makes  the  head  swim. 
Here,  as  everywhere  upon  the  trip,  as  soon  as  the  stage  stopped, 
Mr.  Allen  was  off  to  seek  some  commanding  point  of  view, 
returning  only  in  time  for  the  onward  ride.  Often  in  the  early 
dawn  he  would  be  out  looking  at  the  wonders  spread  before 
him,  and  perhaps  gathering  some  choice  specimens  for  the  home 
collection.  Judge  Hubbard  often  said  on  the  journey,  "It  is  a 
constant  surprise  to  see  the  freshness  of  his  enthusiasm." 

Marvels  were  everywhere.  At  Yellowstone  we  found  that 
even  the  bears  had  lost  their  fear,  so  that  they  would  come  out 
of  the  woods  to  eat  with  the  pigs,  or  steal  choice  morsels  from 
the  huts  of  the  workmen.  The  deer  and  bison  were  frightened 
only  by  the  noise  of  the  steam  whistle. 

From  Yellowstone  Lake  the  road  led  down  the  Devil's 
Slide,  a  way  so  steep  that  the  passengers  felt  every  moment 
they  must  be  thrown  upon  the  backs  of  the  horses.  We  preferred 
to  walk.  At  Trout  Creek  the  funny  Irish  proprietor  of  the  eat- 
ing booth  greeted  us  with,  "Come  right  in,  professor;  we  were 
looking  for  you,  and,  though  we  haven't  yet  secured  the  antlers, 
we  may  before  you  return."  The  Irish  blunder,  so  near  the 
truth,  caused  a  roar  of  laughter  that  was  followed  up  all  through 
the  dinner  hour  by  the  traveling  companions  who  had  been  with 
us  for  weeks. 

The   Lower  Geyser  basin,  where  we  spent  a  glorious  night, 


rilK    WESTERN    TRIP    IN     I  89  I.  I  57 

was  reached  near  the  close  of  the  day.  From  here  to  the  Upper 
Geyser  was  a  continued  succession  of  surprises,  from  the  great 
lake  of  liquid  fire,  whose  overflow  once  in  seven  years  filled  the 
entire  valley  with  desolation,  to  the  tiny  springs,  with  all  their 
wondrous  blending  of  prismatic  colors.  There  were  also  springs 
throwing  up  piles  of  many-hued  clays,  which  were  known  as 
"Paint  Pots."  At  the  Upper  Basin  we  spent  several  hours 
watching  more  than  fifty  of  these  seething  fountains.  Here 
"Old  Faithful"  from  his  boiling  caldron  threw  up  a  shaft  of 
spray  one  hundred  and  fifty  feet  high  every  sixty  minutes. 
Some  forty  of  these  fountains  seen  from  the  steps  of  the  hotel 
were  playing  at  irregular  intervals,  and  took  all  kinds  of  fantas- 
tic shapes.  Among  these  "Baby  F'ountain"  shot  up  its  tiny 
spray  every  sixty  seconds. 

Everything  connected  with  this  strange  land,  so  like  what 
scientists  tell  us  must  have  been  the  state  of  the  world  when 
new,  has  been  so  often  told  and  retold  in  prose  and  poetry  that 
even  our  children  are  familiar  with  all  that  language  can  paint 
or  tongue  can  tell,  so  we  forbear  here  to  say  more  than  that 
these  new  experiences  to  us  were  full  of  joy  and  renewed  life. 

HOMEWARD. 

Rich  in  the  treasures  gathered  and  experiences  gained,  we 
came  homeward  across  the  Dakotas  and  Minnesota,  as  far  as 
Duluth,  thence  down  the  lakes,  reaching  Alfred  in  time  for  the 
beginning  of  the  fall  term. 

Afterward  the  days  and  weeks  of  our  Westward  journey, 
with  pleasant,  joyful  memories,  were  often  re-lived  in  our  home 
and  with  our  friends.  We  both  felt  more  indebted  than  can  be 
expressed  to  the  thoughtful  and  bountiful  generosity  of  our 
friends  Judge  and  Mrs.  Hubbard. 


CHAPTER    XX, 


THE    LAST    YEAR, 


AFTER  the  return  from  the  West,  there  were  the  usual 
preparations  to  be  made  for  the  opening  of  the  school 
^^^  year.  The  strength  imparted  by  change  and  travel 
was  severely  taxed.  All  departments  of  the  University  were 
crowded.  For  some  years  the  seniors  had  been  trained  on  the 
academic  plan.  The  president  gave  out  the  subjects  to  the 
classes,  stated  the  line  of  investigation,  told  them  what  books 
to  consult,  or  gave  them  a  "finding  list."  The  themes  being 
written  out,  the  papers  were  brought  into  the  class  for  dis- 
cussion, he  going  to  the  library  and  pointing  out  sources  of 
information  to  them  that  had  been  neglected.  Extra  time  was 
allowed  this  class  for  practice  in  different  styles  of  writing  and 
in  elocution. 

During  the  year  carpenters  had  been  kept  at  work  making 
new  cases  for  Steinheim.  Many  of  the  winter  evenings  were 
spent  in  classifying  new  specimens  and  rearranging  the  old 
ones.  The  study  floor  was  many  times  covered  with  trays  con- 
taining these,  while  one  was  always  on  the  table,  to  be  attended 
to  at  odd  moments. 

He  especially  enjoyed  the  work  of  that  spring  term,  the 
"last  class"  always  being,  for  the  time,  his  best  one.  When 
the  seniors  came  in  one  day  to  greet  him,  he  said  that  he  often 
felt,  as  Plato  expressed  himself,  that  in  future  years  he  would 
be  glad  to  see  how  well  they  were  carrying  out  their  early  train- 
ing, as  he  had  watched  with  interest  the  after  progress  of  senior 
classes  for  fifty  years. 
(  158) 


THE    LAST    YEAR. 


^59 


At  anniversary  time  a  large  number  of  old  students  were 
with  us,  and  it  seemed  that  we  had  never  better  enjoyed  com- 
mencement week.  Dr.  Robert  Collyer  was  there  to  give  the 
annual  address.  Dr.  Allen  told  the  friends  who  were  anxious 
about  his  health  that  he  felt  he  was  doing  the  best  work  of  his 
life.  But  when  all  were  gone,  we  knew  that  he  was  very  weary, 
but  still  hoped  that  the  vacation  would  restore  him. 


CONCLUSION. 


Our  daughter,  Mrs.  Champlin,  and  family  were  with  us 
during  the  season,  Mr.  Champlin  being  of  great  assistance  in 
many  ways.  As  the  vacation  was  not  giving  the  needed  rest, 
the  family  urged  Mr.  Allen  to  go  away,  where  the  sight  of  what 
needed-to-be-done  would  not  tempt  him  to  overwork.  In  reply 
he  would  quote  from  John  Ouincy  Adams,  "An  old  man  has 
no  time  for  rest."  Seeing  him  at  work  on  the  campus  one  day. 
Rev.  L.  E.  Livermore  said,  "This  is  too  hard  for  you,"  but  he 
smilingly  replied,  "I  do  not  want  to  look  down  upon  imperfect 
work  here  when  I  get  up  therer 

Preparations  were  made  for  the  new  term  as  usual,  but,  after 
consultation  with  his  physician,  he  decided  to  put  his  classes 
into  Mr.  Champlin's  hands  for  a  few  days,  he  appointing  the 
lessons  and  indicating  how  he  would  have  them  treated,  and 
receiving  a  full  report  from  the  class  room  every  day.  But  he 
grew  rapidly  worse. 

A  few  days  before  he  left  us,  he  asked  for  the  manuscript 
of  his  last  sermon.  He  thought  it  would  refresh  him  to  give 
it  a  few  last  touches.  Over  this  he  occupied  himself  for  two 
days,  and  then  laid  down  his  pen  forever.  Every  day  the  very 
sunshine  was  brightened  by  the  fruit,  flowers,  and  other  things 
that  the  love  of  friends  provided.  Letters  that  came  over- 
flowing with  tenderness  gladdened  his  heart.  Not  being  able 
to  lie  down  at  all,  he  spent  much  of  the  time  at  the  open  win- 
dows, looking  out  upon  the  grounds  and  watching  the  students, 
or,  as  he  always  called  them,  his  "children,"  as  they  came  and 


1  6o  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

went  from  the  class  rooms.      A  smile  of  recognition  from  him 
always  greeted  them  as  they  passed  by. 

On  the  morning  of  the  21st  of  September,  1892,  those  who 
stood  near  him  showed  upon  their  faces  their  deep  sympathy 
with  his  suffering.  "  I  am  happy,"  he  said;  "why  cannot  you 
be  so?"  These  were  his  last  words.  In  a  few  moments  he 
had  passed  beyond  mortal  ken,  and  when  those  who  stood  by 
looked  at  the  dear  face  for  the  sign  of  "peace,"  they  saw,  in- 
stead, a  glorious  joy.      The  "last  enemy"  had  been  conquered. 


CHAPTER  XXI. 

MEMORIAL    SERUIGES. 

JONATHAN  ALLEN,  Ph.  D..  D.  D.,  LL.D.,  presi- 
dent of  Alfred  University,  died  at  his  home  in  Alfred, 
N.  Y.,  of  disease  of  the  heart,  September  21,  1892,  in 
the  seventieth  year  of  his  age. 

Brief  but  touching  funeral  services  were  held  on  Friday, 
September  23,  in  the  home  where  President  Allen  had  spent 
the  greater  part  of  his  life.  The  house,  veranda,  hall,  and 
campus  in  front  were  completely  packed  with  friends  who  had 
come  to  pay  the  last  tribute  of  respect  to  him  whose  name  had 
been  a  household  word  in  all  parts  of  the  country  for  nearly 
half  a  century,  one  who  was  loved  by  all,  the  rich  and  poor 
alike. 

The  solemn  hush  that  fell  upon  that  great  assembly  told 
better  than  any  words  could  of  the  deep  feeling  that  touched 
every  heart.  The  profusion  of  flowers,  autumn  leaves,  and 
vines,  that  loving  hands  had  draped  and  twined  about  the  rooms 
and  casket,  betokened  the  love  and  esteem  in  which  the  de- 
ceased was  held  by  the  community  where  he  had  lived  and 
moved,  but  which  neither  words  nor  fragrant  emblems  could 
fittingly  express. 

The  services  were  simple  and  conducted  in  a  very  quiet 
manner.  The  trustees  and  members  of  the  Faculty  were  seated 
as  mourners.  Prayer  was  offered  by  Dr.  D.  E.  Maxson,  and 
Rev.  L.  C.  Rogers  read  selections  from  the  Scriptures.  Intro- 
ductory remarks,  by  Dr.  L.  A.  Platts,  were  followed  by  befitting 
words  from  Dr.  D.  R.  Ford,  of  Elmira,  and  President  W.  C. 
Whitford,  of  Milton,  Wis.      The  services  were  interspersed  by 

(.6,) 


1 62  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

well-selected  music,  and  were  closed  with  prayer  by  Rev.  L.  E. 
Livermore. 

It  has  been  thought  best  to  insert  Ur.  Maxson's  prayer  in 
this  place: — 

"O  thou  great  and  glorious,  holy  and  heavenly  Father,  Father  of  us 
all.  Father  of  our  spirits,  thou  art  the  Maker  of  our  bodies,  and  therefore 
rightfully  takest  them  away  in  thine  own  good  time!  We  thank  thee 
for  the  glorious  doctrines,  evidences,  and  triumphs  over  death  in  the 
resurrection  of  life.  Our  heavenly  Father,  with  bowed  heads  and  sad 
hearts  we  mourn  the  occasion  which  brings  us  here  this  morning;  and 
yet  we  are  glad  for  this  plan  of  redemption,  glad  that  thy  servant  came 
into  that  plan  which  made  his  life  grand,  beautiful,  and  glorious  so  long 
among  us.  May  the  inspiration  from  his  life  gather  force  with  gathering 
years.  O  God,  bless  the  thousands  on  whom  his  benedictions  of  word 
and  deed  have  fallen  all  over  the  land!  Bless  the  Faculty  with  whom  he 
has  toiled  so  lovingly,  and  who  have  looked  to  him  with  so  much  ten- 
derness and  affection.  Strengthen  for  the  work,  now  tiiat  this  one 
has  fallen,  that  will  fall  on  those  who  remain.  O  God,  give  additional 
strength,  that  the  work  may  go  on  with  the  students,  teachers,  and 
trustees!  Father,  may  our  hearts  never  faint,  may  our  zeal  never  dimin- 
ish. Thou  only  canst  heal  the  hearts  that  are  broken.  Strengthen 
her  who  needs  thy  support;  give  the  dear  children  grace  to  bear  afflic- 
tion and  deprivation,  and  help  them  to  cultivate  in  their  lives  the  Spirit 
that  guided  him.  Be  with  us  in  this  hour,  and  grant  that  we  may  leave 
this  house  with  nobler  purposes  and  inspirations.  We  ask  it  in  Jesus' 
name.     Amen." 

After  the  services  the  senior  class,  as  pallbearers,  accom- 
panied the  casket  to  the  train,  as  it  ^was  conveyed  to  Buffalo 
for  cremation.  This  was  in  accordance  with  an  oft-expressed 
wish  of  President  Allen  that  his  body  be  incinerated.  The  cre- 
mation took  place  at  10:30  o'clock  on  Saturday  morning,  the 
24th  inst.,  in  the  presence  of  a  number  of  old  students  living 
in  that  vicinity.  Rev.  Dr.  A.  J.  Purdy  conducted  short  and 
impressive  services  in  the  chapel  connected  with  the  crematory. 
The  next  day  Mr.  George  G.  Champlin,  Professor  A.  B.  Kenyon, 
and  Mr.  Place  returned  from  Buffalo,  bearing  the  precious  ashes, 
which   were  deposited  in  a  beautiful   Greek  vase  of  alabaster. 


MEMOKIAl,    SERVICES. 


163 


The  vase  came  from  the  island  of  Cos,  the  country  and  home 
of  Hippocrates,  and  once  held  the  bones  and  ashes  of  the  first 
king  of  that  isle.      It  dates  from  1200  b.  c. 

At  the  same  hour  of  the  services  in  Buffalo  memorial  serv- 
ices were  held  in  the  Alfred  church,  when  the  following  program 
was  carried  out: — 

OKDliK    OF    EXERCISES. 


Choir 

-    Rev.  B.  C.  Davis 

Rev.  L.  E.  Livermore 


1.  Sentence,  "Blessed  Are  Tiiey  That  Mourn," 

2.  Invocation,  .--_-_ 

3.  Scripture  lesson,     -         -          -         - .        - 

Ps.  20:1,2;   Matt.  5:  3-12;    1  Cor.  15:  12-21,  39-45,  54-58. 

4.  Prayer,       -------   Rev.  Dr.  D.  E.  Maxson 

5.  Hymn,  "Nearer,  My  God,  to  Thee,"         -         -         _       Congregation 


MEMORIAL    ADDRESSES. 

6.  On  behalf  of  the  trustees,   -         -         - 

7.  On  behalf  of  the  Faculty, 

8.  Hymn,  "Jesus,  Lover  of  My  Soul,"    - 

9.  On  behalf  of  the  students,       -         -         . 

10.  On  behalf  of  the  alumni,     -         -         -         . 

11.  On  behalf  of  public  interests, 

12.  Hymn,  "Wait  and  Murmur  Not," 

13.  On  behalf  of  the  Education  Society, 

14.  On  behalf  of  the  church  and  denomination, 

15.  On  behalf  of  moral  reform, 

16.  Hymn,  "Mournfully,  Tenderly,  Linger  We  Here," 

17.  Benediction. 


Rev.  Dr.  L.  A.  Platts 

Rev.  L.  C.  Rogers 

Choir 

Rev.  B.  C.  Davis 

Rev.  Dr.  D.  R.  Ford 

Judge  P.  B,  McLennan 

Choir 

Rev.  Dr.  W.  C.  Whitford 

Rev.  Dr.  T.  R.  Williams 

P.  A.  Burdick,  Esq. 

Choir 


The  church  was  tastefully  decorated  with  flowers  and  autumn 
leaves,  and  the  large  portrait  of  the  president,  surrounded  with 
a  wreath  of  roses,  was  suspended  in  front  of  the  organ. 

Telegrams  of  condolence  were  received  by  the  family  from 
all  parts  of  the  country,  one  of  which,  from  Mrs.  Lizzie  Nelson 
Fryer,  from  Oakland,  Cal,  was  read  during  the  services.  It 
was  this:  "His  life  was  a  blessed  inspiration,  and  his  memory 
is  precious  beyond  words.  With  tenderest  sympathy."  This 
expressed  the  sentiment  of  the  many  that  came  during  those 
days  from  those  who  had  learned  from  him  life's  truer  meaning. 


164  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

The  trustees  offered  the  following  resolutions,  which  have 
been  placed  upon  their  records: — 

"Whereas,  It  has  pleased  the  all-wise  heavenly  Father  to  remove  from 
us  our  fellow  trustee  and  honored  president,  Jonathan  Allen,  whose  death 
has  filled  all  our  hearts  with  sorrow;  therefore, 

"  Rcso/ved,  That  we  bow  in  meek  submission  to  the  all-perfect  and 
divine  will. 

"Resolved,  That  we  place  upon  record  our  appreciation  of  the  faithful 
services  of  President  Allen  in  his  connection  with  this  Institution  for 
more  than  fifty  years, — first  as  a  tutor,  then  as  a  professor  in  the  Academy 
and  University,  and  finally  as  president  for  the  last  twenty-five  years. 

"Resolved,  That  we  also  recognize  and  gratefully  appreciate  the 
untiring  zeal  with  which  he  served  as  a  trustee  of  the  University,  doing 
duty  upon  committees,  and  otherwise  striving  to  promote  the  best  inter- 
ests of  our  beloved  Institution. 

"  Resolved,  That  in  his  death  we  mourn  the  loss  of  a  noble  Christian 
gentleman,  a  profound  scholar,  a  successful  educator,  and  a  true  friend 
of  every  noble  cause. 

"Resolved,  That,  while  thus  recording  our  own  grief  and  sense  of  loss, 
we  do  not  forget  those  who,  in  addition  to  these  sorrows,  shared  by  us 
all,  mourn  the  loss  of  a  devoted  husband  and  father;  and  we  do  tenderly 
commend  them  to  the  loving  care  of  Him  in  whose  presence  is  fullness 
of  joy,  and  at  whose  right  hand  our  beloved  fellow-worker,  our  honored 
president,  has  found  the  sweet  fruition  of  his  earnest  life  and  trusting 
faith." 

This  tribute  to  the  memory  of  President  J.  Allen  is  fur- 
nished by  his  late  associates, — -the  Faculty  of  the  University: — 

"God,  in  his  all-wise  but  mysterious  providence,  having  seen  fit  to 
remove  by  death  our  beloved  and  respected  associate,  Rev.  Dr.  J.  Allen, 
president  of  Alfred  University,  we  do  hereby  cordially  unite  in  testifying 
to  our  very  great  regard  for  him  as  a  scholar,  a  teacher,  and  a  Christian 
gentleman. 

"  He  was  indeed  extremely  modest  in  the  possession  of  these  various 
accomplishments  and  attainments.  Our  relation  to  him,  however,  gave 
us  the  coveted  opportunity  of  knowing,  as  also  of  appreciating,  his  ample 
stores  of  useful  knowledge,  his  breadth  of  scholarship,  his  love  of  learn- 
ing, his  clo.se  and  patient  application  to  study  and  to  his  work  as  teacher, 
his  mental   acumen,   his  self-poise,  and   the  correctness  of  his  judgment 


MEMORIAL    SERVICES.  165 

and  of  his  intuitions.  To  all  these  scholarly  distinctions  must  be  added 
his  genuine  love  of  mankind,  which  made  him  everywhere  and  always 
genial,  and  the  friend  and  favorite  of  students. 

"We  take  pleasure  in  testifying  also  to  the  moral  worth  of  our  late 
associate,  and  to  his  genuine  Christlikeness  of  character.  We  refer  with 
pride  and  satisfaction  to  his  inherent  nobility  of  nature,  his  high  man- 
hood qualities,  accompanied  always  with  commanding  dignity  of  person, 
the  unsullied  purity  of  his  life,  his  self-sacrificing  spirit,  his  devotion  to 
principle,  his  courageous  advocacy  of  social  and  moral  reforms,  his 
tender-heartedness,  his  helpfulness,  his  constant  kindness  to  the  poor,  his 
trust  in  God,  and  his  love  for  and  fellowship  with  all  true  Christians. 
We  are  glad  to  be  able  to  say  that  our  associations  with  our  now  de- 
parted brother  have  been  uniformly  pleasant.  We  have  truly  loved  and 
respected  him,  and  looked  to  him  as  the  venerable  father  and  head  of 
our  beloved  University.  In  offering  this  humble  tribute  of  respect  to  his 
memory,  we  are  profoundly  impressed  with  a  sense  of  the  loss  which  this 
death  occasions,  not  only  to  ourselves,  to  the  alumni  and  students  of 
Alfred  University,  and  to  the  general  public,  but  also  and  especially  to 
the  surviving  members  of  his  deeply  afflicted  family,  with  whom  we  feel- 
ingly share  the  burden  of  this  bereavement,  and  to  whom  we  heartily 
extend  our  assurances  of  high  regard  and  tender  sympathy. 

"As  surviving  members  of  the  Faculty  of  Alfred  University,  inspired, 
as  we  tru.st  we  are  and  ever  shall  be,  by  the  life  of  our  now  departed 
associate,  we  conclude  this  brief  memorial  with  our  fervent  thanks  to  the 
kind  heavenly  Father  for  giving  us  so  illustrious  an  example  of  real 
worth  and  true  nobility  of  character  for  our  further  study  and  fuller  imi- 
tation." 

The  Alfred  Sun  of  that  date  says: — 

"In  the  death  of  President  Allen,  Alfred  loses  a  prominent  and  influ- 
ential citizen,  Alfred  University  a  loved  and  honored  teacher,  and  the 
country  a  profound  scholar  and  learned  educator.  His  life  has  been  so 
closely  interwoven  with  this  Institution  of  learning  that  his  name  and  the 
University  were  synonymous. 

"When  at  about  ten  o'clock  on  Wednesday  morning  the  old  chapel 
bell  began  to  toll  in  mournful  tones,  everyone  understood  too  well  what 
it  said,  yet  all  whispered,  '  Is  he  dead  ? '  We  could  not  realize  it,  although 
we  had  come  to  expect  it.  The  scene  which  presented  itself  in  front  of 
the  chapel,  as  student  after  student  stopped  to  mingle  tears  and  sighs 
with  those  of  their  fellows,  could  but  portray  the  intense  love  and  grati- 


l66  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

tilde  that  they  had  for  him  whose  Hfe  had  fled,  but  whose  hfe  had  been 
an  example  for  the  noblest  to  imitate.  Much  has  been  said  of  the  great- 
ness and  goodness  of  this  life  that  is  spent,  but  the  half  will  never  be 
told,  for  words  cannot  express  it,  and  only  will  it  be  known  when  the 
recording  angel  in  that  great  day  shall  read  it  from  the  pages  of  the 
Book  of  Life.  Although  President  Allen  will  be  with  us  no  more  in 
chapel,  and  no  more  will  we  see  that  grand  and  beautiful  figure  about 
the  campus,  yet  his  memory  will  ever  be  bright  in  the  minds  and  hearts 
of  the  many  whom  he  has  helped  to  nobler  and  better  lives.  Of  him  the 
words  of  Bryant  might  be  truthfully  used: — 

'"Sustained  and  soothed 
By  an  unfaltering  trust,  approach  thy  grave, 
Like  one  that  wraps  the  drapery  of  his  couch 
About  him  and  Hes  down  to  pleasant  dreams.'  " 

At  a  meeting  of  the  students  on  Wednesday  afternoon, 
the  following  resolutions  were  offered  to  the  memory  of  Rev. 
Dr.  J.   Allen,   president,   deceased: — 

"We,  the  students  of  Alfred  University,  and  members  of  its  literary 
societies,  having  been  called  this  day,  by  the  death  of  our  beloved  presi- 
dent, Rev.  Dr.  J.  Allen,  to  part  with  one  so  loved  and  honored,  do  hereby 
express  our  high  appreciation  of  his  worth  and  worthiness,  the  true 
nobility  of  his  nature,  the  manhood  qualities  he  possessed,  his  kindliness 
of  heart,  his  self-forgetfulness,  and  his  ever  loving  care  of  others,  his  sub- 
lime and  unbroken  faith  in  the  divine  Saviour  of  mankind. 

"In  offering  this  tribute  to  the  memory  of  our  dear  departed  presi- 
dent and  friend,  we  can  but  express  our  sense  of  deep  loss  which  this 
death  brings  to  ourselves  and  others,  and  especially  to  his  bereaved 
family,  to  whom  we  extend  the  expression  of  our  true  affection  and 
tender  sympathy.  Committee." 

Note. — Much  that  was  said  at  the  memorial  services  has  been  inserted  in  other 
chapters  of  this  book. 


MEMORIAL    SERVICES.  I  67 

REMARKS    BY     PRESIDENT    W.    G.    WHITFORD, 
OF    MILTON,    WIS 

"I  bring  a  message  of  sympathy  and  heartfelt  grief  to  this  com- 
munity and  the  members  of  the  University  from  the  people  of  Milton, 
embracing  the  Faculty  and  students  of  the  college  there,  old  graduates 
of  Alfred,  and  citizens  who  knew  President  Allen  in  his  youth.  There 
have  been  committed  to  me  special  words  of  love  and  condolence  to  the 
afflicted  family,  particularly  to  the  esteemed  wife.  We  mingle  our  sorrow 
with  that  of  a  great  multitude  of  acquaintances  and  friends  in  different 
parts  of  the  country. 

"It  is  known  that  the  deceased  president  spent  a  portion  of  his  young 
manhood  in  Milton.  The  farmhouse  in  which  he  lived,  and  the  fields 
which  he  harvested,  are  still  pointed  out  to  us.  His  parents  resided 
there  the  last  years  of  their  life,  and  he  was  an  occasional  visitor  at  their 
home.  At  such  times  he  was  always  greeted  with  pleasure,  not  only  by 
his  relatives,  but  also  by  his  earliest  friends  living  there.  For  several 
terms  he  was  the  principal  of  the  old  Milton  Academy,  and  was  after- 
ward invited  to  become  the  permanent  president  of  that  institution,  before 
he  was  elected  to  the  same  position  in  your  University.  Other  ties  unite 
us  most  closely  with  you,  especially  the  older  inhabitants  of  Alfred,  and 
cause  us  also  to  feel  deeply  this  bereavement.  Our  first  settlers  emi- 
grated from  your  hills  and  valleys,  and  brought  with  them  the  educa- 
tional spirit  which  was  imparted  to  them  in  the  first  years  of  the  history 
of  your  Institution.  They  made  Milton  College  the  child  of  Alfred  Uni- 
versity, finding  in  the  latter  nearly  fifty  years  ago  their  example  and 
their  model.  The  first  teacher  here  was  the  first  teacher  there;  the 
studies  pursued  here  were  the  studies  adopted  there.  No  educational 
worker  in  our  denomination  has  ever  been  more  fully  convinced  than 
was  President  Allen  that  collegiate  schools,  like  that  at  Milton,  should 
be  organized  and  conducted  among  our  churches  in  the  West.  From 
him  we  have  received  words  of  approval  and  encouragement  in  our  labors. 
Why  should  we  not  grieve  at  his  death  ? 

"The  internal  life  of  President  Allen,  the  secret  of  his  great  influence 
over  others,  and  the  instruction  in  his  classes, — with  all  these  you  are 
familiar,  and  they  have  guided,  moulded,  and  stimulated  your  very  beings. 
But  he  has  been  filling  a  place  which  connected  him  with  movements 
and  persons  outside  of  your  locality,  and  even  beyond  the  boundaries  of 
your  State  and  the  nation.  His  stadents  and  associates  are  found  in  the 
four  quarters  of  the  globe,  in  an  exalted  station  in  the  National  Senate  of 


l68  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

this  country,  in  the  humble  and  useful  occupation  of  a  district  school- 
teacher, and  in  the  honorable  pursuits  lying  between  these.  He  chose 
the  labors  of  an  instructor,  and  that  at  the  head  of  a  strong  University, 
so  that  he  could  affect  most  powerfully  the  lives  of  young  men  and 
women  coming  in  contact  with  him,  and  fit  them  most  successfully  for  a 
beneficent  and  happy  career.  He  thus  made  the  most  goodly  and  last- 
ing impressions  upon  hundreds  and  thousands  in  our  denomination, 
some  of  whom  are  our  chiefest  and  best  beloved  leaders.  The  teacher 
is  the  prime  mover  in  the  affairs  of  the  church,  society  at  large,  and  the 
civil  power.  He  stands  at  the  fountain  head  of  all  streams  of  whole- 
some influence.  To  inform  and  direct  the  boys  and  girl§  of  a  great 
community  is  to  assume  charge  of  the  grown-up  men  and  women,  of 
controlling  intelligence  and  energy  therein.  Such  labor  is  worthy  to 
engage  exclusively  the  thoughts  and  the  heart  of  any  man  of  superior 
endowments  of  soul.  No  one  else  understood  this  fact  better  than  did 
President  Allen;  so  he  was  contented  to  occupy,  and  faithfully,  as  his 
life's  work,  the  position  he  filled  with  such  distinction.  He  never  sought 
some  ofificial  place,  which  he  would  have  greatly  honored,  in  a  wider 
educational  field  or  in  the  councils  of  the  nation. 

"We  have,  in  the  past  few  years,  been  called  to  mourn  the  death  of 
our  most  eminent  teachers,  those  who  originated,  managed,  and  gave 
success  to  our  denominational  schools.  The  first  on  the  list  was  the 
talented  and  knightly-souled  Kenyon,  your  former  president,  who  gave 
you  the  confidence  and  the  ability  to  found  here  a  University.  I  stood 
about  a  year  since  before  the  house  in  London,  England,  where  he 
breathed  his  last,  and  thought  of  his  enthusiasm,  the  lightning  speed  of 
his  intellect,  and  the  vigor  of  his  purpose,  as  exhibited  here  with  his 
coworkers  in  the  training  of  the  youth,  whom  he  guided  with  almost 
unexampled  skill.  Next  came  the  fatherly,  self-denying,  and  large- 
minded  Irish,  whose  toils  here  in  the  early  days  of  your  Institution,  and 
later  at  De  Ruyte^,  will  ever  be  remembered  by  his  grateful  and  loving- 
pupils.  Recently  we  bade  adieu  to  the  gentle,  scholarly,  and  polished 
Carpenter,  our  first  college  graduate  of  this  century,  and  the  first  prin- 
cipal of  a  school  established  by  our  people.  His  body  rests  in  a  foreign 
grave.  Last  we  stand  in  the  presence  of  the  remains  of  the  dignified, 
comprehensive,  and  philosophical  Allen,  whose  mind  was  rounded  like 
a  ball,  and  could  roll  in  any  direction  it  chose.  He  was  not  a  specialist, 
a  mere  agitator,  but  he  had  the  ability  to  grasp  the  ultimate  principles 
of  any  subject  within  the  range  of  human  investigation,  and  at  the  same 
time  to  collect  and  arrange  the  many  details  of  that  subject  into  a  prac- 
tical  unity  under   the  guidance  of  those  principles.     This  is  a  rare  gift. 


MEMORIAL    SERVICES. 


69 


In  conducting  the  interests  of  your  Institution,  in  participating  in  the 
affairs  of  your  community,  and  in  suggesting  the  work  of  our  denomi- 
nation, he  has  been  a  masterful  organizer.  His  place  cannot  be  easily 
supplied. 

"It  is  meet  that  we  attend  these  funeral  services  on  the  grounds  of 
the  University,  in  sight  of  its  buildings,  in  the  midst  of  this  scenery  loved 
so  well,  and  surrounded  by  those  interesting  associations  with  which 
President  Allen  had  become  most  familiar  through  fifty-six  years  of  his 
life  as  a  student  and  a  teacher  in  this  village.  Look  upon  the  hallowed 
place,  contemplate  and  admire  his  noble  work,  consider  how  he  has 
moved  here  the  lever  which  has  lifted  to  a  higher  level  many  choice 
spirits,  and  the  tasks  which  they  have  accomplished,  and  resolve  that 
your  aims,  your  efforts,  and  your  natures  shall  in  the  future  be  worthier 
and  still  more  useful  because  of  his  example,  his  instruction,  and  his 
devotion  to  you." 


For  we  speak  of  you  cheerfully  always 

As  journeying  on ; 
Not  as  one  who  is  dead  do  we  name  you — 

We  say  you  are  gone. 

For  how  could  we  speak  of  you  sadly, 

We  who  watched  while  the  grace 
Of  eternity's  wonderful  beauty 

Grew  over  your  face  ? 

"M.  E.  H.  Everett. 


'Alas!  what  tribute  may  I  bear 

To  thee,  dear  father,  friend  of  my  far-off  youth  ? 
With  dimmed  eyes  and  whitening  hair 

I  turn  to  lay  upon  thy  grave,  in  ruth, 
One  flower  of  love,  and  drop  a  grateful  tear. 


Thy  grave!  where  may  I  find  thy  grave  ? 

No  green  slope  of  thy  native  hills 
Cherishes  one  violet  thy  dear  dust  gave. 

The  mighty  music  of  the  pine  tree  thrills 
Along  the  forest  column  s  nave, 


yO  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

"  But  lingers  not  around  thy  sacred  tomb. 

I  listen  to  the  tossings  of  the  troubled  sea, 
If  he  may  murmur  news  of  thy  last  home. 

Nor  land,  nor  wind,  nor  sea,  can  show  to  me 
A  mound,  a  stone,  that  marks  thy  earthly  doom. 

"  'Tis  well ;  who  loves  but  nature's  outward  grace, 
The  tree,  the  flower,  the  stone,  let  him  receive 
Such  tribute.     Who  hath  power  to  trace 

In  human  lives  the  record  he  would  leave 
Wins  what  no  cenotaph  can  give,  nor  death  efface. 

"  Elvira  E.  Kenyon. 


'And  has  the  chieftain  fallen— he. 

The  strong  and  true,  the  grand  and  free, 

A  leader  in  the  realm  of  thought, 

Who  to  his  lifelong  purpose  brought 

Endurance,  courage,  pure  desire, 

A  living  faith,  a  soul  of  fire, 

The  steadfastness  of  heart  and  will, 

Life's  holiest  mission  to  fulfill  ? 

'  He  is  not  dead.     In  all  that  gives 
To  life  its  value,  still  he  lives. 
In  influence,  usefulness,  and  power. 
He  lives  most  worthily  this  hour. 
He  lives  in  hearts  whose  love  is  warm. 
In  characters  he  helped  to  form. 
In  countless  lives  made  pure  and  bright 
By  his  example,  precepts,  light. 

"  f)eath  but  as  God's  evangel  came  ; 
The  grave  no  victory  could  claim. 
And,  backward  borne  by  heavenly  breeze. 
We  catch  such  whisperings  as  these, 
'  Be  earnest,  diligent,  and  strive 
Each  day  a  nobler  life  to  live. 
Whate'er  your  work,  where'er  you  rove. 
Faithful  to  God  and  duty  prove. ' 

"  Mary  Bassett  Clarke. 


CHAPTER    XXII. 

UIEWS    OF    PRESIDENT   ALLEN'S    GHARAGTER. 

ON     BEHALF    OF     PUBLIC     INTERESTS. 
[Extracts  from  the  address  of  Judge  P.  B.  LcLennan.] 

SUCH  a  life  as  has  been  portrayed  upon  this  sad  occasion, 
President  Allen's  life,  must  of  necessity  have  materially 
affected  public  interests ;  a  character  so  grand  and  noble,  so 
kingly  yet  so  childlike  in  innocent  simplicity,  majestic,  yet 
tender  as  a  mother's  love,  imperious,  yet  ever  pleading  to  come,  never 
commanding  to  go;  a  character  builded  upon  pure  and  noble  thought 
and  action,  the  outgrowth  of  God's  lesson  as  he  learned  it  from  nature's 
volume,  ever  spread  open  before  him;  a  character  such  as  his  made  an 
indelible  impression  upon  the  lives  of  all  with  whom  he  came  in  contact. 
He  sipped  God's  love  from  the  tiny  flowers,  saw  his  majesty  in  the 
sturdy  oak,  his  power  in  the  tempest,  his  grandeur  in  the  starry  firma- 
ment— a  beautiful  and  divine  purpose  in  all.  The  plane  upon  which  he 
dwelt  was  so  high  that,  day  by  day,  mingled  with  the  discordant  notes  of 
humanity,  he  heard  the  music  of  God's  angels  sound  so  beautiful  as  to 
lead  him  ever  to  point  higher  and  still  higher. 

"President  Allen's  life.so  moulded,  was  consecrated  to  God  and  human- 
ity, was  consecrated,  my  friends,  to  you  and  to  me.  For  more  than  half 
a  century  he  traveled  life's  great  highway,  with  a  bearing  so  kingly  as  to 
compel  our  homage,  strewing  God's  flowers  by  the  wayside,  and  thus 
winning  our  love;  carrying  the  heaviest  burdens,  and  thus  challenging 
our  admiration.  Indeed,  an  honest  man,  in  God's  own  image,  passed 
along. 

"Think  you  that  such  a  life  did  not  materially  affect  the  public  inter- 
ests of  a  locality,  of  a  State,  of  a  nation  ?  Its  outcroppings  are  seen  on 
every  hand.  In  the  schoolrooms  throughout  the  land  noble  men  and 
women  who  were  taught  at  his  feet  are  day  by  day  transmitting  his 
enthusiasm,  his  power,  his  soul,  to  the  boys  and  girls  of  the  common- 
wealth.    In  business  centers  his  students  are  contending,  both  by  pre- 

(171) 


72 


LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 


cept  and  example,  for  better  methods,  for  stricter  honesty  and  closer 
application.  Those  engaged  in  the  professions  realize  a  greater  responsi- 
bility to  clients  and  patients  for  having  heard  his  proclamation  of  duty. 
In  the  legislative  halls  throughout  the  nation  there  are  those  who  heard 
his  views  as  to  the  duty  of  the  legislator,  who  were  taught  his  Puritan 
notions  of  honesty,  and  who  are  standing  in  this  critical  period  of  our 
country's  history  as  a  bulwark  against  corruption  in  high  places  and 
imbecility  in  the  discharge  of  the  duties  of  public  trusts.  In  the  pulpit 
thousands  of  his  devotees  are  pleading  in  Christ's  name  with  weak,  with 
foolish  humanity,  to  be  stronger  and  wiser,  and  to  come  upon  the  higher 
plane  where  he  dwelt.  In  every  avocation  of  life  there  are  those  who 
are  endeavoring  to  practice  the  precepts  which  he  taught,  endeavoring 
to  follow  his  example,  and  are  thus  helping  a  little  to  make  life's  path- 
way more  beautiful,  man's  abode  upon  earth  more  heavenlike.  Thou- 
sands, yes,  tens  of  thousands,  are  under  the  influences  of  his  noble 
life  to-day,  and  as  the  years  go  on  they  will  multiply  and  still  mul- 
tiply, until  the  truths  which  he  taught— God's  truths — having  been  trans- 
mitted from  soul  to  soul,  shall  be  known  throughout  the  world. 

"  Dear  friend  and  loved  one,  thou  art  not  dead.  Those  attributes  of 
thy  character, — love,  truth,  purity, — can  never  die.  Sleep  for  an  hour  if 
thou  wilt.  Rest,  if  thou  must;  but  thy  glorious  work  must  go  on  for- 
ever and  forever.  In  our  weakness  now  we  shed  a  tear.  If  we  were 
strong  we  would  leap  for  joy  that  a  noble  soul  is  now  untrammeled,  that 
it  may  soar  higher  and  higher,  even  to  the  house  of  God,  and  from  thence 
be  a  still  more  potent  helper  in  working  out  God's  divine  purpose  toward 
man.  Thy  seeming  death  emphasizes,  vitalizes,  the  influences  of  thy  life. 
Thy  students,  thy  children,  engaged  in  the  more  public  activities  of  life, 
will  pause  for  at  least  a  moment  to  shed  a  tear,  but  will  consecrate  them- 
selves anew  to  higher  and  nobler  things,  to  the  emulation  of  thy  example. 

"Would  that  in  this  hour  of  sorrow  I  could  pay  the  tribute  of  my 
heart  to  my  absent,  not  dead,  benefactor.  I  cannot  speak  the  words. 
The  thought  of  his  many  kindnesses,  of  his  unselfish  love  for  me,  would 
overwhelm  even  a  stronger  heart.  Instead,  let  me  pledge  a  lifelong 
fidelity  to  Alfred  University,  the  capstone  of  his  life's  work,  the  object  of 
his  tenderest  devotion." 


VIEWS    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN  S    CHARACTER.  1 73 

ON  BEHALF  OF  MORAL  REFORMS. 

[From  an  address  at  the  same  service  by  Mr.  P.  A.  Burdick.*] 

"  '  He  rests  with  the  immortals;  his  journey  has  been  long; 
For  him  no  wail  of  sorrow,  but  a  ptean  full  and  strong, 
So  well  and  bravely  has  he  done  the  work  he  found  to  do, 
To  justice,  freedom,  duty,  God,  and  man  forever  true.' 

"Of  the  many  elements  which  combined  to  make  Jonathan  Allen  a 
great  man,  no  element  of  character  was  more  prominent  than  his  advo- 
cacy of  ail  moral  reforms.  God  made  him  with  the  positive  forces 
necessary  for  this  work.  The  talents  given  him  were  not  hidden  but 
developed,  and  so  they  brought  forth  an  hundred-fold. 

"The  sacrifices  and  denials  made  for  the  University  he  loved,  and  for 
which  he  gave  his  life,  strengthened  in  him  the  qualities  essential  to  the 
character  of  a  reformer.  He  had  the  most  positive  convictions,  and  the 
courage  to  follow  them.  He  never  stopped  to  consider  results  when  a 
great  truth  was  to  be  vindicated  or  a  great  wrong  to  be  overthrown. 
His  duty  was  to  defend  the  truth,  to  condemn  the  w;'ong.  Results  he  left 
with  God.  He  had  the  courage  to  think,  to  act,  to  tell  harsh  truths,  to 
dethrone  splendid  falsehoods,  to  follow  the  voice  of  God,  even  though  it 
led  into  the  wilderness.  God  gave  him  to  the  world  at  a  time  when  such 
a  character  could  have  the  greatest  possible  scope.  The  hidden  moral 
forces  had  long  been  gathering  into  form,  and  waited  the  coming  of 
resolute,  fearless  souls  to  become  their  champions. 

"Foremost  among  the  men  who  led  the  advance  in  all  reform  work 
stood  Jonathan  Allen.  At  an  early  age  the  question  of  slavery  claimed 
his  attention,  and  before  he  had  reached  his  majority  he  became  an 
enthusiastic  and  aggressive  advocate  of  the  antislavery  movement. 
With  his  great  love  for  the  truth  he  became  the  champion  of  the  most 
radical  antislavery  principles,  and  cast  his  lot  with  Garrison,  Phillips,  and 
Birney.  This  act  cost  him  popularity  with  the  masses,  turned  some 
friendships  into  gall,  but  did  not  swerve  him  from  his  course.  It  was 
weakness  against  strength,  the  oppressed  against  the  oppressor.  It  was 
justice  against  injustice.  For  him  to  have  done  else  than  defend  such  a 
cause  would  have  been  bartering  away  his  own  individuality.  No  cry  of 
compromise  or  expediency  was  of  avail.  The  slave  pen,  the  auctionblock' 
the  lash,  and  the  bloodhound,  were  formidable  pleaders,  and  his  answer 
was,  'Here  am  I.'  He  lived  to  see  and  enjoy  the  victory,  the  black  man 
no  longer  a  slave,  but  a  free  man.  God  spared  him  not  only  to  behold 
the  dawning  of  the  morning,  but  to  look  upon  the  golden  sunset. 

*Mr.  Burdick,  one  of  the  foremost  temperance  evangelists  in  America,  was 
prostrated  from  overwork  in  Chicago,  and  died  soon  afterward  at  his  home  in  Alfred, 
in  June,  1893. 


174  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

"Of  all  the  moral  reforms  he  upheld  none  was  dearer  to  his  heart  than 
the  temperance  movement.  He  became  a  total  abstainer  at  the  age  of 
thirteen,  signing  the  pledge  at  a  temperance  meeting  under  the  auspices 
of  the  Washingtonians.  In  those  days  the  use  of  liquor  in  the  home  was 
almost  universal,  his  home  being  no  exception.  He  was  laughed  at  and 
jeered  at  by  his  companions,  and  was  the  recipient  of  many  persecutions. 
This  only  made  him  stronger  in  his  convictions.  He  never  changed  in 
his  prdcepts;  as  he  came  in  contact  with  young  men  who  became  the 
victims  of  the  drink  curse,  he  learned  to  pity  the  victim  and  hate  the 
traffic.  With  his  great  love  for  humanity  he  again  put  on  the  whole 
armor  of  God. 

"The  manliness  of  manhood,  the  virtue  of  womanhood,  the  sanctity  of 
home,  our  Christian  civilization,  was  imperiled  by  this  monster,  the  liquor 
traffic.  He  had  seen  it  change  from  a  passive  nuisance  into  an  aggressive 
evil.  He  saw  it  organized  into  a  mighty  power,  defying  law.  controlling 
courts  of  justice,  and  dictating  the  administration  of  government.  True 
to  every  principle  which  made  his  life  noble,  loyal  to  his  convictions,  which 
made  his  life  sublime,  he  again  dared  to  be  ahead  of  the  times,  and  raised 
his  voice  and  cast  his  ballot  against  the  great  sin  of  the  nation.  His 
sensitive  nature  was  wounded,  his  heart  grieved,  at  the  unjust  censure 
from  those  who  could  not  understand  his  motives,  but  he  bore  these 
added  burdens  bravely,  uncomplainingly,  heroically. 

"Jonathan  Allen  did  not  live  for  what  the  world  could  give  him, but 
for  what  he  could  give  the  world.  And  one  of  the  sweetest  thoughts  in 
this  sad  hour  is  that  his  own  individuality  of  character  has  been  molded 
into  the  lives  of  thousands  who  have  come  under  his  special  care  and 
influence.'  There  are  men  and  women  here  to-day  who  are  better  men 
and  women,  with  higher  aspirations,  with  broader  lives,  who  have  reached 
nearer  the  throne  of  God,  because  they  came  close  to  his  great  heart. 

"  His  faith  and  works,  like  streams  that  intermingle 
In  the  same  channel,  ran. 
The  crystal  clearness  of  an  eye  kept  single 
Shamed  all  the  frauds  of  man. 

"The  very  gentlest  of  all  human  natures 
He  joined  to  courage  strong, 
And  love  outreaching  unto  all  God's  creatures. 
With  sturdy  hate  of  wrong. 

"And  now  he  rests;  his  greatness  and  his  sweetness 
No  more  shall  seem  at  strife. 
And  death  has  moulded  into  calm  completeness 
The  statue  of  his  life." 


VIEWS    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN  S    CHARACTER.  1 75 

A    COMPLETED    LIFE    WORK. 

JUDGE    M.  N.   HUBBARD. 

""Thou  hast  embarked;  thou  hast  made  the  voyage;  thou  art  come  to  the  shore." — 
Marcus  Aureliiis  Antoninus. 

"Physically  and  mentally,  men  are  of  two  kinds,  copies  and  original 
types.  President  Allen  was  an  original  type  in  both  respects.  He  did 
not  look  nor  act  like  other  men.  Most  men  are  so  similar  that  the  differ- 
ence is  not  marked,  and  then  they  are  frequently  taken  one  for  the  other. 
No  one  ever  mistook  President  Allen  for  anybody  else.  He  was  over 
six  feet  high,  broad-shouldered,  and  massive.  His  face  was  an  uncom- 
mon one,  and  his  large  blue  eyes  had  an  unmistakable  expression  of 
unusual  sympathy  and  kindness.  Every  lineament  was  an  earnest 
entreaty  to  all  in  distress  or  who  needed  help  to  come  to  him.  His  head 
indicated  remarkable  mental  power,  and  his  calm,  dignified  bearing  stimu- 
lated everyone  to  emulate  him  and  to  become  like  him.  Modesty  and 
humility  could  not  fail  to  be  read  by  all  from  every  expression  of  word, 
or  countenance,  or  act.  There  was  not  a  trace  of  selfishness  in  all  his 
life.  He  was  a  great  teacher,  intent  only  on  uplifting  the  young  to  a 
higher  plane  of  life,  and  on  making  mankind  better  in  every  way.  He 
took  no  thought  of  himself;  his  sole  life  work  was  to  make  Alfred  Uni- 
versity a  great  blessing  to  mankind  by  pointing  to  the  higher  and  better 
way  of  life  through  a  higher  education. 

"Good  actions  are  of  three  kinds:  First,  those  which  we  do  for  our- 
selves; second,  those  which  we  do  for  our  kindred;  and,  third,  those 
which  we  do  for  others.  President  Allen  devoted  all  his  learning,  all  his 
energy,  all  his  gentle  loving-kindness,  to  the  good  of  others.  It  is  easy 
for  all  of  us  to  be  good  to  ourselves  and  to  our  children,  but  the  number 
of  great  men  who  devote  themselves  wholly  to  the  good  of  others  is 
few  and  rare. 

"President  Allen  was  not  a  man  of  special  gifts,  but  excelled  in  all 
branches  of  learning.  Whether  he  taught  Greek,  or  Latin,  or  mathe- 
matics, or  metaphysics,  or  science,  or  rhetoric,  or  astronomy,  or  geology, 
or  logic,  he  impressed  one  that,  like  Lord  Bacon,  he  had  chosen  all  fields 
of  knowledge  to  be  his  province.  His  mental  powers  ranged  the  entire 
gamut  of  intellectual  greatness,  and  his  voice  modulated  to  every  good 
sentiment  and  emotion. 

"He  was  not  only  deeply  learned,  but  he  was  a  born  orator.  He  was 
eloquent  without  being  conscious  of  it,  and  without  any  effort  or  intention 
to  be  so,  and  it  was  so  because  his  whole  soul  was  intent  only  to  make 
better  his  fellowmen,  and  lead  them  to  the  higher  way. 


176  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

"While  he  generally  spoke  without  notes,  he  seldom  spoke  extempo- 
raneously, and  never  on  a  subject  of  importance.  Thorough  preparation 
and  analysis  preceded  all  his  public  efforts,  and  he  never  fell  below  expec- 
tation— although  much  was  expected  of  him. 

"But  high  above  all  the  attainments  of  this  marvelous  man  in  every 
kind  of  human  knowledge,  stand  his  moral  attributes,  his  precepts  and 
example. 

"Prince  Guatama,  the  original  Buddha,  taught  the  kingdom  of  right- 
eousness on  earth  by  the  noble  eightfold  path  of  right  views,  high  aims, 
kindly  speech,  upright  conduct,a  harmless  livelihood,  perseverance  in  well- 
doing, intellectual  activity,  and  earnest  thought.  Gautama's  religion, 
however,  ended  here.  He  prophesied  nothing  for  the  future  except 
eternal  rest — the  nirvana.  He  regarded  man  as  a  tiny  part  of  a  great 
universal  whole,  and  as  impossible  of  a  real  individual  existence  as  that 
a  drop  of  the  ocean  should  become  a  sea  by  itself 

"The  human  race,  like  the  ocean,  seems  immortal, but  the  human  race 
differs  from  the  ocean  in  that,  at  least  for  a  time,  individual  existence  is 
a  real  fact,  while  the  drops  composing  the  ocean  are  practically  always 
blended. 

"Christ  came  six  thousand  years  later  than  Gautama,  and  gave  us  the 
inspiring  doctrine  of  the  individual  immortality  of  the  soul  in  a  future 
kingdom  of  heaven,  in  addition  to  the  kingdom  of  righteousness  on  earth 
as  taught  by  Gautama.  And  herein  lies  the  difference  in  the  religion  of 
the  European  and  the  Asiatic.  Let  the  civilization  and  progress  of  the 
two  peoples  settle  the  controversy,  if  any,  between  the  two  religions. 
Certain  it  is  that  the  hope  of  individual  immortality  in  the  kingdom  of 
heaven  has  been  accompanied  by  an  individual  strife  for  individual  supe- 
riority and  excellence  here,  which  has  created  a  jostling,  bustling,  omniv- 
orous civilization,  and  which  of  itself  suggests  the  doctrine  of  the  'sur- 
vival of  the  fitte-st.' 

"President  Allen  taught  and  exemplified  in  his  daily  life  the  kingdom 
of  heaven,  as  well  as  the  kingdom  of  righteousness  on  earth.  His  mind 
was  too  broad  and  catholic  to  be  bound  by  any  mere  creed  of  any  par- 
ticular church,  and  it  is  doubtful  if  he  ever  said  a  single  word  in  favor  of 
or  against  any  particular  non-essential  tenet,  dogma,  or  mere  doctrine, 
or  form,  or  catechism,  or  discipline  of  any  particular  church.  From  all 
sermons  and  from  his  daily  walk  and  talk  all  that  could  be  gathered  was 
that  he  was  a  broad-minded,  tolerant  Christian.  He  was  the  only  man 
the  writer  ever  knew  who  overcame  in  himself  both  ignorance  and  selfish- 
ness— the  two  chief  causes  of  human  sorrow — and  he  labored  unceas- 


VIEWS    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEn's    CHARACTER.  IJ'J 

ingly  to  help  mankind  to  this  desired  goal.  He  devoted  his  life  to  make 
Alfred  University  strong  to  this  end.  A  simple  instance  illustrates:  At 
a  commencement  a  few  years  before  his  death,  his  friends  presented  him 
a  few  hundred  dollars  as  a  token  of  their  appreciation  of  his  love  and 
labor  for  the  University  he  adorned  so  much.  He  was  much  surprised, 
and,  looking  at  the  money  in  a  dazed  way,  said,  '  I  never  had  as  much 
money  as  this  at  one  time  in  all  my  life,  and  I  do  not  know  what  to  do 
with  it,  unless  I  give  it  to  the  University.'  Many  similar  instances  might 
be  given.  He  devoted  all  his  great  learning,  all  his  energy  of  soul  and 
body,  all  his  life,  to  the  founding  of  Alfred  University,  and  all  its  alumni, 
scattered  all  over  this  goodly  land,  bring  garlands  and  reverence  to  the 
tombs  of  President  Kenyon  and  President  Allen,  who,  by  their  courage, 
wisdom,  enthusiasm,  executive  ability — and  without  money — founded  a 
school  where  more  than  ten  thousand  in  the  past  have  drunk,  and  many 
times  ten  thousand  in  the  future  may  drink,  deeply  from  the  Pierian 
spring. 

"Will  President  Allen  be  long  remembered  here?  For  it  must  be  con- 
ceded by  most  of  us  that,  hand  in  hand  with  our  longing  for  an  immortal 
future,  goes  a  like  craving  to  leave  an  immortal  remembrance  that  we 
have  not  lived,  even  here,  in  vain. 

"Born  into  the  world  without  our  knowledge,  we  leave  it  without  our 
consent.  Nearly  fifteen  hundred  millions  have  come  and  gone  every 
thirty-three  years  for  thousands  of  years,  and  this  will  continue  for  all 
time  to  come.  The  house  of  eternal  fame  on  earth  is  very  small,  has 
many  windows,  but  few  niches,  and  little  space  on  its  walls  for  the  busts 
and  portraits  of  the  great. 

''The  founders  of  a  new  religion  that  takes  deep  and  lasting  root 
among  mankind  will  live  as  long  as  their  religion  lives.  Christ  and  his 
apostles  and  the  prophets,  Buddha  and  Mohammed,  seem  to  be  immortal. 
The  founder  of  a  new  nation  (for  the  founding  is  always  attributed  to  one 
man),  and  the  saviour  of  a  nation  in  peril  (like  Washington  and  Lincoln), 
seem  immortal.  But,  judging  the  future  by  the  past,  the  lives  of  nations 
have  an  end.  Each  generation  has  its  own  statesmen  and  its  own  litera- 
ture, and  those  whose  memory  survives,  even  among  their  own  country- 
men, fifty  years  after  they  are  gone,  are  very  few.  Intellect  and  goodness 
are  alone  immortal,  and  they  live  detached  from  mortal  bodies,  without 
name,  and  their  unseen  power  is  only  visible  in  the  gradual  rise  of  the 
race  from  ignorance  and  selfishness  to  the  higher  plane  of  wisdom  and 
universal  love.  True  human  greatness  is  not  heralded  by  the  noise  of 
cannon  or  brass,  nor  is  it  perpetuated  by  marble  or  bronze. 


lyS  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

"A  few  great  generals  have  appeared  and  written  their  names  across 
the  sky  of  history.  Nine-tenths  of  mankind  now  Hving  can  count  all 
the  names  of  great  men  they  can  recall,  on  their  fingers,  and  the  other 
one-tenth  would  exhaust  themselves  with  a  hundred  or  two  names.  This 
sort  of  immortal  remembrance  is  fleeting  and  vain. 

"President  Allen,  during  his  fifty  years  as  professor  and  teacher, came 
into  personal  acquaintance  with  ten  thousand  young  men  and  women  of 
more  than  ordinary  intellect.  He  made  as  profound  an  impression  upon 
them  as  did  Plato  or  Aristotle  upon  their  pupils.  These  ten  thousand 
have  gone  into  all  the  earth,  and  other  tens  of  thousands  follow,  and  all 
bear  the  impress,  to  some  extent,  at  least,  of  the  intellect,  the  goodness 
and  greatness  of  this  great  teacher.  And  thus  it  is  that  his  influence 
goes  on  in  an  ever  widening  and  never  ending  path,  to  bless,  to  cheer,  to 
purify,  to  elevate.  His  immortality  is  like  himself  while  with  us  here — 
modest,  charitable,  unselfish,  sweet,  all-pervading,  and  altogether  blessed. 
May  we  all  of  us  live  as  he  lived,  teach  as  he  taught,  and  die  as  he  died, 
is  the  wish  of  ,  One  of  His  Pupils." 


OVER    THE    SOl'TH    BRIDGE. 


GliAPTER    XXIII 


MEMORIES    FROM    OLD    STUDENTS. 

FROM    COLONEL    WESTON    FLINT,    LL.U.,    OF    WASHINGTON,    D.    C. 

I  TRUST  you  will  not  think  me  negligent  in  delaying  to  express  my 
great  personal  loss  in  the  death  of  President  Allen.  I  know  how 
very  little  words  can  do  to  tell  what  the  heart  feels,  and,  more,  how 
empty  words  are  to  those  upon  whom  a  great  grief  has  fallen,  as  it 
has  upon  you.  But  I.  must  express  my  own  sorrow;  I  feel  as  if  some 
great  part  of  personal  life  were  gone  from  my  immediate  grasp.  It  is 
not  gone,  but  the  first  feeling  is  one  of  loneliness.  But  then  again  I 
think  of  what  I  have  garnered  up  in  the  soul,  what  precious  influences 
for  good  have  been  with  me  all  my  life,  and  will  be  to  the  end,  that  came 
from  that  noble  heart,  now  stilled. 

"  To  me  President  Allen  resembled  the  grand  philosophers  of  old. 
He  was  a  man  who  looked  to  the  bottom  of  things,  hence  his  hatred  of 
shams.  He  wanted  what  was  noble  in  a  man,  and  hence  his  pure 
democracy  of  giving  everyone,  whatever  his  place  in  life,  rich  or  poor, 
his  due  reward.  He  saw  through  men.  He  was  at  times,  as  some  of 
us  thought,  a  little  severe,  yet  he  was  as  tender  as  a  woman. 

"  I  do  not  think  that  the  students  who  received  so  much  from  him  all 
these  years  appreciated  the  greatness  of  his  character,  but  they  will  do 
so  as  the  }'ears  go  on.  His  toil  of  a  lifetime  in  such  a  noble  work  leaves 
its  impress  on  humanity.  It  goes  down  the  ages.  The  outward  ex- 
pression of  the  wealth  of  the  soul  that  has  fallen  upon  human  hearts  is 
far  more  enduring  than  all  else  in  this  world. 

"It  was  a  disappointment  that  I  could  not  be  with  you  as  the  last 
words  were  spoken  in  his  honor;  but  the  words  that  were  spoken  by 
him  are  far  more  important  to  us  all.  I  shall  ever  remember  him  as  the 
lofty  ideal  of  a  true  man. 

"There  is  so  much  of  grandeur  in  a  character  like  President  Allen's 
that,  although  I  feel  keenly  the  loss  that  has  come  to  us  in  his  death, 
yet,  more  than  all,  I  rejoice  that  such  a  priceless  inheritance  has  been 
left  in  his  noble  self-sacrifice  of  a  life  for  the  good  of  others." 

(179) 


l8o  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

FROM    DR.    DANIEL    LEWIS,    PRESIDENT    OF    THE    NEW    YORK    STATE    MEDICAL 
ASSOCIATION. 

"Our  lamented  president  of  Alfred  possessed  so  remarkable  a  combi- 
nation of  great  and  striking  qualities  that  no  brief  paragraphs  of  mine 
can  adequately  enumerate  them.  After  I  left  college  (where  it  was  my 
privilege  to  know  him  as  intimately  as  any  alumnus  could),  and  com- 
pared his  personality  with  many  men  of  wide-extended  reputation,  the 
one  feature  which  impressed  me  more  than  another  in  President  Allen 
was  the  transcendent  nobility  of  his  ideals  of  life.  I  believe  that  my 
most  abject  failure  in  his  estimation  (and  I  remember  many)  was  an  effort 
made  to  meet  his  views  in  an  anniversary  oration  upon  a  theme  he  wished 
me  to  treat. 

"While  it  was  a  grand  experience  for  Alfred  students  to  be  under  his 
tuition,  yet  I  now  see  that  his  own  powers  were  restricted  in  so  limited 
a  sphere  of  action.  If  his  field  had  been  the  great  world  of  the  metrop- 
olis, for  example,  no  man  of  the  present  generation  could  have  achieved 
a  more  brilliant  or  lasting  reputation  in  his  chosen  field  of  scientific  work 
or  upon  the  platform. 

"  His  diversity  of  great  talents  were  a  marvel  to  me.  He  was  a 
master  in  natural  history,  a  leader  in  philosophy  and  theology,  an  expert 
in  the  classics,  in  rhetoric  unapproachable,  in  the  pulpit  with  few  equals 
in  this  or  any  other  country.  In  his  intercourse  with  boys  he  misun- 
derstood them  often,  as  they  failed  to  appreciate  him,  but  in  maturer 
years  they  became  his  warm  advocates  and  most  devoted  adherents  at 
all  times  and  everywhere. 

"Alfred  College  can  never  find  another  President  Allen,  but,  if  his 
influence  still  lives  in  the  hearts  of  the  alumni  and  friends,  his  successor 
will  be  enabled  by  other  aid  to  take  up  and  advance  the  work  which  he 
so  nobly  carried  on,  until  the  past  history  of  the  school  shall  become 
only  as  the  dawn  of  a  bright  and  prosperous  day." 

REMINISCENCES    OF    ALFRED,    BY   JUDGE   STEPHEN    G.    NYE. 

"My  first  introduction  to  tlie  school  at  Alfred  was  in  1854.  It  was 
then  known  as  'Alfred  Academy  and  Teachers'  Seminary,'  and,  as  its 
name  indicated,  its  province  was  the  education  of  public  school-teachers, 
and  the  preparation  of  young  men  for  college;  but  it  was  far  more  than 
that.  To  me  it  was  the  opening  of  a  new  world.  It  seemed  as  if  we 
breathed  the  atmosphere  of  optimism.  I  went  there  intent  on  pursuing 
academic  studies  for  a  year  or  two,  and  then  intended  to  take  up  the 
study  of  medicine;  but  the  conception  of  a  full  college  curriculum  was 


MEMORIES    FROM    OLD    STUDENTS.  151 

something  that  even  imagination  was  not  permitted  to  entertain.  Like 
the  great  bulk  of  Alfred  students,  I  earned  the  means  for  fu'ther  edu- 
cation by  teaching  and  by  labor,  that  brought  monetary  return.  After 
I  had  enlisted  as  a  student,  the  most  frequent  question  was,  'What  col- 
lege are  you  preparing  for?'  I  found  there  a  great  army  of  young  men 
without  purse  or  fortune,  as  confident  of  college  honors  as  if  they  were 
already  attained.  It  seemed  to  me  the  sublimity  of  impudence;  I  grew 
to  believe  it  the  sublimity  of  faith.  I  had  not  been  a  student  there  thirty 
days  until  the  current  swept  me  along,  and  I  was  literally  'in  the  swim,' 
and  saw  my  college  parchment  just  ahead  as  distinctly  and  certainly  as 
if  it  were  already  in  my  grasp.     In  due  time  it  came. 

'' I  had  never  seen  any  institution  before,  I  have  7iever  seen  one  since ^ 
where  the  sentiment  that  all  things  are  possible  to  him  who  strives  seemed 
so  completely  to  permeate  and  pervade  and  satttrate  arid  possess  and  ener- 
gise student  life  as  at  Alfred. 

"The  social  atmosphere  was  purely  democratic.  Sons  of  the  rich 
were  there;  but  nothing  in  the  student  intercourse  could  indicate  who 
they  were.  In  the  winter  of  1855  I  left  Alfred  to  replenish  my  purse  by 
teaching.  The  warmest  welcome  I  received  on  my  return  in  the  spring 
was  from  the  son  of  a  wealthy  manufacturer  of  New  York  City,  who 
somehow  seemed  to  think  that  I  was  enjoying  advantages  he  did  not 
possess.  Of  course  I  looked  at  it  in  a  different  light.  Such  boyhood 
ought  to  develop  into  noble  and  useful  manhood,  and  it  did. 

"The  influence,  or  atmosphere,  or  sentiment,  or  ambition,  or  what- 
ever you  may  term  it,  that  surrounded  Alfred,  which  developed  high 
resolve  and  ardent  effort,  was,  as  I  have  said,  peculiar  to  itself  Its  cause, 
I  think,  was  in  its  teachers.  Professor  Kenyon,  the  founder  of  the  school, 
was  the  principal,  or  president.  Earnest,  energetic,  tireless,  zealous  for 
the  good  of  the  students,  with  a  mind  fertile  in  expedients,  a  man  whose 
early  life  was  along  narrow  lines,  where  '  low  living  and  high  thinking' 
had  built  up  a  magnificent  manhood,  whose  sympathies  reached  out  with 
stout  words  and  strong  arms  to  the  young  who  trod  the  rugged  paths 
over  which  he  had  journeyed,  he  was  the  ideal  teacher.  His  rare  ability 
in  that  character  was  in  nothing  more  strongly  shown  than  in  the  selec- 
tion of  his  associate  teachers.  Professor  Jonathan  Allen  was  one  of 
these.  He  had  completed  his  collegiate  course  at  Oberlin,  and  we  can 
readily  understand  that,  under  the  guidance  and  influence  of  the  profound 
Dr.  Mahan,  and  the  blunt,  truthful,  energetic,  sham-hating,  liberty-loving 
President  Finney,  a  mind  tempered  like  Professor  Allen's  suffered  no 
detriment.  When  he  returned  to  Alfred,  in  1849,  Piofessor  Kenyon 
made  no  mistake  in  selecting  him  as  associate  teacher. 


1 82  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

"When  I  first  knew  him  I  was  a  boy  of  twenty;  he  was  a  dozen 
years  older.  Whether  because  of  a  taste  for  studies  wherein  he  had 
made  deeper  research,  or  whatever  cause,  to  me  he  seemed  head  and 
shoulders  above  his  fellows.  Tall,  erect,  of  commanding  presence,  he 
filled  the  Roman  ideal,  mens  sana  in  cor  pore  sano. 

"In  the  field  of  mental  and  moral  science  he  was  particularly  at 
home.  In  the  class  room,  some  of  us,  in  a  spirit  of  mischief,  or,  as  we 
termed  it,  'to  try  his  gait,'  sometimes  raised  a  discussion  on  lines  opposed 
to  the  books,  and  nothing  pleased  him  more  than  the  independent  thought 
that  led  outside  of  the  text.  If  we  could  rou.se  him  to  pace  the  floor,  we 
knew  that  the  feast  was  cooking,  and  that  it  would  soon  be  spread. 
When  the  argument  came,  his  favorite  position  was  facing  the  class,  the 
index  finger  of  his  right  hand  breast  high ;  this  seemed  the  conduit  off 
which  rolled  syllogism,  logic,  and  illustration,  his  gaze  apparently  going 
through  and  beyond  us,  as  if  thence  he  drew  upon  the  depot  of  his 
intellectual  supplies.  Even  the  advent  of  a  new  class  for  the  succeeding 
hour  could  hardly  divert  him  from  the  line  of  thought  until  the  argument 
was  complete.  And  back  of  all  there  seemed  depths  that  we  had  never 
sounded,  and  reserves  of  power  never  measured.  As  a  Damascus  blade, 
when  point  and  hilt  have  met,  resumes  position  when  freed, so  beseemed 
able  to  sustain  any  load,  and  to  resume,  fresh  and  vigorous,  his  native 
posture  when  the  burden  was  removed. 

"Twenty-nine  years  after  leaving  Alfred  I  visited  the  school  for  the 
first  time,  and  then  but  for  a  single  day.  Of  all  the  teachers  that  were 
there  in  the  old  days,  Dr.  Allen  and  his  wife  alone  remained.  Others 
had  been  promoted  from  the  student  ranks,  and  the  doctor  had  been 
president  for  many  years  of  the  great  Institution  grown  upon  the  founda- 
tion planted  by  Professor  Kenyon  so  long  ago.  Changed  he  was,  and 
yet  the  same.  Hair  and  beard  had  whitened,  but  mind,  and  soul,  and 
heart  had  grown  broader,  stronger,  deeper,  and  so  had  the  great  Institu- 
tion of  which  he  was  the  head.  It  was  plain  that  the  old  spirit  pervaded 
the  student  ranks.  He  still  inspired  them  with  the  faith  that  all  things 
come  to  those  who  have  faith  to  labor  and  to  wait.  Looking  back  over  the 
struggles  of  the  early  history  of  Alfred,  the  enduring  labor  and  patience 
of  Professors  Kenyon  and  Allen,  the  thousands  in  the  generations  of  the 
young  who  came  under  the  energizing  and  inspiring  influence  of  their 
school,  and  their  personal  influence,  and  the  Institution  they  have  left  us, 
certain,  it  seems  to  me,  that 

"  'They  builded  better  than  they  knew.'  " 


MEMORIES    FROM    OLD    STUDENTS.  1 83 

REMINISCENCES    OF    ALFRED,    FROM    CHARLES    A.    CHAPIN. 

"  I  first  met  Professor  Allen  as  a  teacher  in  Alfred  University  during 
the  spring  term  of  1859.  He  had  charge  of  the  rhetoric  class  at  that 
time.  I  recall  the  names  of  some  members  of  that  class,  among  them 
Wallace  W.  Brown,  Seymour  Dexter,  L.  L.  Bacon,  and  H.  C.  Randolph. 
The  class  was  large,  being  made  up  of  a  lively  assortment  of  young  men 
and  women ;  in  fact,  it  was  spirited  at  times,  and  Professor  Allen  took 
great  pleasure  in  putting  the  members  through  their  lessons  and  their 
rhetorical  exercises.  Toward  the  end  of  the  term  we  had  a  public  review, 
when  a  large  number  of  the  students  were  selected  to  deliver  declama- 
tions and  orations.  Mr.  Wallace  W.  Brown  was  called  upon  first  (we 
used  to  call  him  Cicero),  and  acquitted  himself  in  a  splendid  manner. 
Professor  Allen  remarked,  as  he  closed  his  speech,  that  Brown  was  a 
natural  born  orator,  and  would  some  day  make  a  congressman.  This 
remark,  made  in  the  professor's  own  inimitable  manner,  bothered  us  at 
the  time  to  tell  whether  it  was  praise  or  criticism,  but  was  afterward 
verified  with  honor  to  Mr.  Brown  and  to  his  Alma  Mater.  I  had  also 
been  selected  to  deliver  a  declamation,  or  an  oration  of  my  own  produc- 
tion. I  cho.se  the  latter,  although  I  had  then  had  very  little  experience 
or  training  in  composition  writing.  I  did  the  best  I  could,  but,  as  I  closed, 
the  professor  smiled  meditatively,  and  remarked,  '  Your  eloquence  is 
superb,  but  your  rhetoric  is  wretched.' 

"Two  years  later,  Brown,  Dexter,  Bacon,  and  myself,  together  with 
eight  or  nine  others,  laid  aside  our  studies,  and,  two  days  after  Fort 
Sumter  was  fired  upon,  started  for  Elmira  to  enlist  in  the  volunteer 
service  in  defense  of  the  Union.  I  well  remember  that  afternoon  when 
we  first  had  the  news  that  the  stars  and  stripes  had  been  fired  upon  by 
rebel  guns.  The  classes  were  speedily  dismissed,  and  all  the  professors 
and  students  gathered  in  front  of  the  college  building,  where  speeches 
were  made  and  the  situation  eloquently  discussed.  Here  it  was  that  I 
remember  Professor  Allen  so  well.  Standing  on  the  steps  of  the  Ladies' 
Hall,  he  made  a  most  eloquent  and  patriotic  speech.  His  courageous 
attitude  and  eloquent  words  fired  the  hearts  of  all  before  him.  He  told 
the  young  men  that  the  country  looked  to  them  for  its  defense,  that  they 
must  stand  ready  to  go  to  battle  at  the  first  sound  of  the  trumpet  of  war, 
that  they  must  not  consider  school,  home,  father,  nor  mother,  but  coun- 
try first,  and  that  support  and  encouragement  and  every  assistance 
possible  would  be  rendered  them  by  patriotic  Allegany. 

"After  we  returned  from  the  war  (having  left  behind  us  two  of  our 
companions.  Bacon  and  J.  E.  B.  Maxon),  Mr.  Dexter  and  I,  together  with 


184  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

several  others,  took  special  instructions  under  Professor  Allen  in  the 
preparation  of  our  commencement  exercises.  The  professor  was  an 
excellent  teacher  of  elocution.  I  recollect  that  on  several  occasions  he 
took  position  on  the  hill  east  of  the  college,  and  sent  us  on  the  west  hill, 
more  than  half  a  mile  distant,  making  us  declaim  in  a  manner  that  we 
could  be  heard  by  him  distinctly.  All  this  training  was  enjoyable  to  the 
class  and  was  splendid  exercise,  but  the  people  in  the  town  below  us 
never  did  quite  understand  what  all  that  shouting  was  about.  The  pro- 
fessor had  a  powerful,  clear  voice,  and  it  seemed  no  effort  for  him  to  make 
himself  plainly  and  distinctly  heard  at  the  distance  of  three-quarters  of 
a  mile,  on  a  still  day. 

A   SCIENTIFIC    OUTING. 

"  Professor  Allen  was  as  fond  of  the  natural  sciences  as  he  was  of  homi- 
letics,  mental  philosophy,  and  rhetoric,  but  geology  and  botany  were  his 
favorites.  He  often  took  the  classes  out  for  special  work  in  these  branches. 
One  of  these  expeditions  came  to  grief,  much  to  his  displeasure.  A  day 
was  set  apart  a  week  or  so  ahead  for  the  advanced  class  in  geology  to  go 
on  an  exploring  jaunt  for  the  investigation  of  various  formations  and 
fossils.  .The  party,  by  some  preconcerted  arrangement,  was  composed  of 
six  young  ladies  and  six  gentlemen,  and  I  have  always  stoutly  maintained 
that  the  young  ladies  made  the  arrangement  and  decided  who  should  be  of 
the  party  to  accompany  the  professor  on  this  expedition.  We  were  fully 
equipped  with  hammers,  baskets,  and  luncheon,  and  started  out  early,  to 
make  a  complete  day  of  it.  I  can  see  the  professor  now  as  he  led  us 
down  into  the  gorge  toward  the  'Bridge,'  among  the  bluffs  and  crags, 
stalwart  and  grand  as  he  was,  while  the  mountains  towered  above,  and 
the  pines  stretched  out  their  arms  in  welcome  to  our  coming.  It  was  a 
scene  of  grandeur  and  beauty.  It  was  natural  that  we  should  become 
inspired  there,  but  as  we  did  so,  somehow  or  other,  all  the  admiration  of 
the  grandeur  and  beauty  about  us  seemed  to  be  enjoyed  particularly  in 
couples.  The  day  grew  hot;  the  march  slackened;  the  party  straggled 
and  became  broken  up,  some  suddenly  becoming  weary  and  hungry.  Two 
or  three  of  the  braver  ones,  however,  kept  within  call  of  the  professor,  so 
as  to  allay  suspicion  if  possible.  It  was  simply  infatuating  to  watch 
those  young  ladies  try  to  break  stones  in  the  interest  of  science,  and  at 
the  .same  time  lavish  their  sweet  smiles  and  flash  their  lovely  eyes  on 
their  escorts.  Science  was  nowhere  to  us,  and  geology  was  as  'dead  as 
the  ages'  in  the  midst  of  such  beauty  and  loveliness,  and  of  this  the  pro- 
fessor soon  became  convinced.  At  first  he  wore  a  disturbed  and  half 
angry  expression;  then  he  became  stern  and  dignified,  as  though  he  had 


MEMORIES    FROM    OLD    STUDENTS.  1 0*5 

been  deceived;  but  the  whole  party  were  his  warmest  and  truest  friends, 
and  as  he  was  compelled  to  yield  to  the  inevitable,  he  did  so  gracefully. 
Summoning  us  together,  he  addressed  us  about  as  follows  :  'Young  ladies 
and  gentlemen,  this  geological  expedition  was  planned  and  arranged  for 
your  scientific  instruction  and  edification.  There  are  many  interesting 
and  instructive  lessons  to  be  learned  here,  but  you  have  perverted  the 
whole  program,  and  have  done  it  deliberately  and  intentionally,  and  I  see 
that  you  are  not  at  all  interested  in  the  research  of  these  formations  and 
fossils.  On  the  other  hand,  you  seem  to  be  utterly  absorbed  and  intensely 
interested  in  animated  nature.  This  expedition  is  at  an  end.  You  were 
excused  for  the  day,  but  you  will  be  expected  to  report  as  usual,'  and 
he  departed.  The  professor  had  gone,  and  we  were  free  from  restraint, 
and  all  this  delightful  and  lovely  scenery  was  ours  to  enjoy.  It  was,  in 
fact,  an  outing  just  such  as  we  had  longed  to  participate  in. 

"Dexter  and  I  graduated  in  the  class  of  '64,  and  bade  good-by  to 
Alfred,  to  President  Allen  and  his  most  estimable  wife. 

"  In  the  little  hamlet  of  Wirt  Center,  New  York,  one  bright  day 
in  May,  1868,  President  Allen  united  in  marriage  Miss  Belle  Wheeler 
and  Charles  A.  Chapin,  and  a  month  later  Miss  Ella  Weaver  and  Sey- 
mour Dexter  were  married.  These  four  persons  accompanied  Professor 
Allen  on  that  geologizing  expedition." 

REMINISCENCES    OF    ALFRED,    BY    VANDELIA    VARNUM. 
THE   TEACHER. 

"  It  was  the  breadth  of  the  man  that  made  him  preeminently  a  teacher. 
So  far  as  the  technical  book  knowledge  was  concerned,  the  student  might 
or  might  not  learn,  just  as  he  pleased.  To  be  sure,  if  he  were  idle  or 
indifferent,  his  standing  would  be  down,  not  only  that  of  the  class  room, 
but,  what  was  of  even  more  importance,  the  character  standing,  and  occa- 
sionally, too,  a  bolt  from  a  cloudless  sky  would  warn  him  that  the  ele- 
ments were  not  unmindful  of  his  negligence, 

"  But  it  was  in  that  higher  realm  of  grasping  truth,  of  utilizing  knowl" 
edge,  of  inspiring  life,  that  the  teacher  shone  most  brilliantly.  To  make 
the  scholar  is  one  thing,  to  make  the  man,  the  woman,  is  another  thing, 
and  it  was  here  his  ministration  upon  student  life  was  most  felt.  No 
one  who  had  a  grain  of  aspiring  impulse  could  come  in  daily  contact 
with  this  broad  life  and  not  feel  its  uplifting  power.  '  Look  up,  look  up,' 
he  would  say;  'never  down,  never  backward,  but  upward  and  forward.' 

"If  the  current  of  young  life  did  not  move  in  just  the  choice  line  he 
would  have  it,  he  knew  that  individuality  was  more  than  grafted  knowl- 


1 86  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

edge,  and  the  natural  bent  of  the  soul  more  than  the  polished  imitation 
of  another  life,  and  in  his  own  rounded  nature  he  sought  to  give  it 
stronger  impetus  after  its  way. 

'"  I  have  tried  my  best  to  make  a  scientist  of  you,'  he  said  to  a  student 
who  was  never  born  for  that  field,  '  but ' — '  You  couldn't  do  it,  could  you  ? ' 
'  Oh,  no,  I  gave  that  up  a  long  time  ago ! '  '  But  really,  professor,  you 
don't  want  me  to  be  always  fussing  and  fooling  around  with  bugs,  and 
bees,  and  sticks,  and  stones,  and  truck!'  'Truck!  truck!'  and  his  eye 
glanced  over  the  treasures  of  the  beautiful  Steinheim.  'Truck!  that's 
what  any  heathen  would  say;'  and  then  he  added,  'No,  I  wouldn't  have 
it  any  different.  Some  are  made  to  grow  wheat,  some  to  grind  it,  some 
to  make  the  bread,  and  some  to  break  it  to  humanity.  The  highest  gift 
is  the  last — to  grasp  truths  that  others  have  discovered  and  proven,  and 
feed  the  multitudes.' 

TOO    MUCH    INTERESTED. 

"One  bitter  cold  morning  in  February  the  class  in  international  law 
found  the  fire  in  their  room  but  recently  built,  and  the  temperature  just 
struggling  up  from  zero.  We  hovered  about  the  stove,  the  president 
with  the  rest,  when  one  of  the  students  observed  a  smoke  arising  from 
some  quarter,  and,  after  ascertaining  the  cause,  broke  in  upon  the  lecture 
with,  '  President,  your  coat  is  too  warm.'  He  gave  the  smoking  phantom 
a  brush,  with  the  remark,  'Never  mind  my  coat,'  and  continued  with  the 
lecture.  'But,  president,'  continued  the  student,  not  willing  to  be  a 
silent  witness  of  such  destruction,  'your  coat  is  on  fire.'  'Well,  well, 
well,  you  are  greatly  worried  over  my  coat,'  was  the  response.  The  class 
burst  into  a  laugh,  and  I  think  that  was  the  first  he  had  really  known 
what  was  taking  place,  so  absorbed  was  he  in  the  matter  he  was  deliv- 
ering. 

SHORT   ENOUGH    SOMETIMES. 

"Although  President  Allen  was  sometimes  accused  of  using  long, 
belabored  sentences  in  prepared  addresses  and  articles  for  the  press,  yet 
there  were  times,  very  vivid  to  some  of  us,  when  no  such  accusation 
could  be  made.  One  of  those  times  is  indelibly  engraven  on  my  memory. 
It  was  the  first  occasion  when  the  '  unpermitted  association '  rule  of  the 
Institution  was  broken.  A  gentleman  was  in  our  room  by  invitation  of 
myself  or  my  roommate,  or  both,  or  neither,  it  makes  no  difference  now, 
but  at  any  rate  he  was  there,  and  not  only  there,  but  he  kept  there.  The 
chapel  bells  rang  out  their  slumber  song,  but  he  did  not  hear  their  call. 
It  sometimes  happens  that  the  conversation  of  students  becomes  so 
weighty  and  engrossing  that  such  minor  matters  pass  unnoticed. 

"  Finally  there  was  a  step  on  the  stairway.     A   sympathetic  glance 


MEMORIES    FROM    OLD    STUDENTS.  1 8/ 

was  exchanged  by  the  roommates,  but  the  guest  did  not  take  the  hint. 
Soon  the  door  opened,  and  there,  with  a  lantern  in  his  hand,  in  a  fire-red 
dressing  gown,  and  long  white  hair  blown  by  the  four  winds,  stood  the 
president.  Such  a  picture  I  never  saw.  To  me,  with  my  heart  crowding 
my  eyes  out,  he  looked  twice  his  natural  size,  and  seemed  to  embody 
the  subdued  wrath  of  a  thunder  cloud.  My  roommate,  with  more 
courage  than  discretion,  broke  the  silence  by  asking  him  in,  and  offering 
him  a  seat.     Not  a  word  in  response.     Then,  in  tones  like  the  breaking 

of  the  cloud,  came  the  words, '  Mr. ,  g-o  home:     It  was  a  plain,  short, 

crisp,  Anglo-Saxon  sentence,  and  no  mistaking  its   meaning.     Mr.  : 

reached  for  his  hat.  By  that  time  I  had  crowded  my  heart  back  far 
enough  to  say,  '  He  was  trying,  professor,  to  convert  us  to  the  seventh 
day.'  'U — h,'  came  the  reply.  Not  another  word  was  spoken,  and,  when 
it  was  past,  my  roommate  and  I  talked  it  over,  and  wondered  how  we 
could  meet  the  president  the  ne.xt  morning.  However,  before  we  fell 
asleep,  we  planned  to  go  down  early  in  the  morning  and  confess.  We 
did  so,  and  found  him  in  his  big  chair,  with  broad  arms  extending  on 
either  side,  the  thunder  cloud  all  gone,  and  the  welcome  sunshine  of  a 
new  day  gleaming  on  every  side.  We  each  appropriated  an  arm  of  the 
chair,  and  it  did  not  take  long  to  '  make  up.'  I  shall  always  believe  it 
was  just  a  bit  easier  for  him  to  forgive  the  girls  than  the  boys. 

CAME   TO   OUR   HELP. 

"At  one  time  one  of  the  ladies'  societies  invited  the'AUeghanians'  and 
proposed  to  give  a  little  extra  feast  in  a  'breach  of  promise'  case.  It 
was  leap  year,  and  the  plaintiff,  of  course,  was  a  young  man  who  sought 
to  heal  his  lacerated  heart  through  the  court.  Everything  was  arranged, 
parts  assigned  and  learned,  judge,  lawyers,  witnesses,  everything  but  the 
jury;  and  while  we  proposed  to  have  our  own  jurors,  yet  the  first  draw- 
ing was  made  from  among  our  guests.  The  dignified  theologians,  the 
learned  seniors,  all  were  brought  up  and  questioned  minutely  in  regard 
to  parentage,  age,  early  training,  life  work,  and  general  qualifications, 
and,  strange  to  say,  were  invariably  found  wanting  in  some  particular, 
usually  being  dismissed  for  'lack  of  ordinary  intelligence.'  The  plaintiff, 
not  being  able  to  defend  himself,  on  account  of  sex,  lost  his  case,  and 
was  forever  to  be  a  'scoundrel  of  the  deepest  dye.'  It  was  an  enjoyable 
occasion  all  around,  but  the  ' Alleghanians '  thought  they  could  get  a  great 
deal  more  fun  out  of  it  by  carrying  the  suit  up  and  having  a  public  trial 
in  the  chapel.  The  plain  truth,  so  far  as  the  ladies  were  concerned,  was 
this:  We  had  had  a  good  time;  the  jokes  were  mostly  on  the  boys;  our 
meaner  knowledge  of  law  was  exhausted,  and  we  did  not  care  to  throw 


1 88  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN.  ■ 

ourselves  into  their  legal  clutches  in  a  public  performance,  nor  did  we 
care  to  acknowledge  our  fear  by  refusing  to  go  on;  so  two  of  us  slipped 
around  to  the  president,  told  him  of  the  situation  before  the  request  for 
the  use  of  the  chapel  could  reach  him,  and,  when  it  came,  behold,  it  was 
refused.  A  few  knew  how  the  refusal  happened,  and  were  satisfied,  but 
the  boys  thought  he  had  spoiled  a  lot  of  fun.  I  think  in  all  emergencies 
he  never  failed  to  help  out  the  girls." 

REMINISCENCES    OF    ALFRED,    BY    MARY    SETCHEL    HAIGHT. 
THE   JULIA   WARD   HOWE   CONTROVERSY. 

"The  conservative  and  radical  elements  of  the  school  did  not  ahvays 
harmonize,  and  in  the  spring  of  1871  circumstances  occurred  which 
arrayed  these  elements  against  each  other  in  such  a  manner  that  the 
feeling  became  bitter  and  personal  on  the  question  of  woman's  rights. 

"At  an  informal  session  of  the  lyceums  Mrs.  Howe  was  proposed  as 
anniversary  speaker,  and  accepted.  The  gentlemen,  exasperated  by 
remarks  made  by  President  Allen  in  the  meantime,  on  the  subject  of 
Equal  Rights,  declared  the  action  taken  illegal,  and  that  no  woman  should 
lecture  upon  that  stage.  The  ladies  felt  themselves  pledged  to  Mrs. 
Howe,  and  would  not  yield.  A  war  of  words  followed.  Faculty,  trus- 
tees, and  townspeople  entered  the  contest  for  or  against.  The  feeling 
became  so  ridiculously  intense  that  one  of  the  leaders  of  the  opposition 
said,  '  If  Mrs.  Howe  goes  upon  that  stage,  it  will  be  over  my  dead  body.' 
President  Allen's  merriment,  when  told  of  this  tragical  declaration,  can 
only  be  appreciated  by  those  who  knew  how  keen  was  his  sense  of  the 
ridiculous.  After  various  sessions  and  much  discussion  the  majority 
decided  in  favor  of  Mr.  Bartlett,  of  Chicago.  But  the  end  was  not  yet. 
A  few  young  ladies  felt  that  they  had  the  right  to  secure  the  services  of 
Mrs.  Howe,  should  they  so  decide.  The  chapel  was  engaged  for  an 
evening  previous  to  commencement  week.  Mrs.  Howe  was  informed  of 
the  controversy,  and  invited  to  lecture  to  a  select  few  upon  the  same 
terms  she  had  given  the  societies.  The  invitation  was  accepted.  On 
June  9  four  girls  might  have  been  seen  in  consultation  upon  one  of  the- 
street  corners  of  the  town,  each  carrying  in  one  hand  a  mysterious 
bundle,  in  the  other  hammer  and  tacks.  They  separated.  Shops  and 
stores  were  entered,  cheese  factories  visited,  board  fences  brought  into 
requisition,  and  soon  the  town,  through  its  entire  length  and  breadth, 
was  billed,  and  in  so  thorough  a  manner  that  he  who  ran  might  read 
that  Julia  Ward  Howe  %vonld  lecture  at  Alfred,  on  a  subject  of  living 
interest.     This  self-constituted  committee  of  four    thought  it  better  to 


MEMORIES    FROM    OLD    STUDENTS.  1 89 

withhold  the  subject  of  her  lecture.  '  Living  interest'  was  suggested  by 
President  Allen,  and  hailed  with  delight,  as  it  would  enable  the  com- 
mittee to  keep  the  opposition  on  the  anxious  seat  a  few  days  longer. 
The  gentlemen  had  been  assured  we  did  not  wish  a  lecture  on  Woman's 
Rights;  but  during  those  years,  to  the  average  masculine  mind,  the 
thought  that  a  woman  could  lecture  upon  any  other  subject  did  not  often 
present  itself     Men  are  wiser  now. 

"The  calm  that  followed  the  final  decision  of  the  societies  was  broken. 
The  discussion  was  resumed  with  renewed  energy.  One  gentleman  said, 
as  he  stood  watching  the  effect  of  the  information  contained  in  the  bills: 
'  Boys,  own  yourselves  beaten.  This  is  the  most  glorious  flank  move- 
ment I  have  known  since  Grant  fought  the  'battle  of  the  wilderness.' 
One  gentleman,  who  had  intended  to  leave  property  to  the  Institution, 
said  he  would  not  give  one  dollar  if  Julia  Ward  Howe  were  permitted 
to  lecture  in  the  chapel.  Others  said  the  same,  until  thousands  of  dol- 
lars were  .staked  upon  the  lecture.  It  would  be  interesting  to  know  how 
many  cents  on  a  dollar  of  this  money  ever  found  its  way  into  the  coffers 
of  the  University. 

"At  first  the  committee  were  inclined  to  hold  their  position.  The 
chapel  had  been  hired,  from  the  proper  authorities,  for  the  evening,  and 
the  lease  could  not  be  canceled  without  the  consent  of  the  committee. 
They  were  at  heart  devoted  to  President  Allen,  and  no  action  was  taken 
without  his  approval.  Not  wishing  to  do  anything  that  might  prove 
detrimental  to  the  future  interests  of  the  school,  it  was  decided  to  take 
the  lecture  to  Hornellsville.  The  town  was  again  billed.  The  political 
phrase,  'A  New  Departure,'  had  just  been  born,  and  President  Allen 
suggested  it  as  a  good  heading  for  new  posters.  This  suggestion  was 
acted  upon,  and  the  posters  were  larger  than  before.  The  public  were 
informed  that  the  lecture  advertised  to  be  held  at  the  chapel  in  Alfred 
would  be  given  at  Hornellsville.  Reasons  for  the  change  would  appear 
in  small  bills.  Great  was  the  inquiry  and  manifold  the  questions  con- 
cerning these  small  bills,  but  they  did  not  appear  until  the  day  of  the 
lecture,  when  they  were  found  to  contain  a  simple  statement  of  the  reason 
for  the  new  departure,  notices  of  the  press  concerning  Mrs.  Howe's  ability 
as  a  lecturer  and  scholar,  the  '  Battle  Hymn  of  the  Republic,'  with  a 
rehearsal  of  the  circum.stances  under  which  it  was  written,  and  closed 
with  this  appeal  to  the  public:  'The  ladies  who  have  the  pleasure  of 
announcing  this  lecture  respectfully  invite  the  public  who  have  read  with 
delight  the  productions  of  Mrs.  Howe's  pen,  and  all  who  would  honor  a 
noble  life,  a  beautiful  and  symmetrical  womanly  character,  brilliant  talents 


190  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

devoted  to  the  good  of  humanity,  and  who  beheve  mfrcc  speech,  to  enjoy 
with  them  the  pleasure  of  listening  to  Mrs.  Howe  at  the  lecture,  as  above 
announced.'  Saturday  morning,  July  i,  Mrs.  Howe,  as  yet  ignorant  of 
the  change  of  program,  was  met  by  the  committee  at  Hornellsville,  and 
that  evening  gave  to  a  large  and  appreciative  audience  her  lecture  on 
Culture.  A  large  delegation  from  Alfred  was  present,  the  railroad  officials 
stopping  trains  in  order  to  accommodate  the  party.  During  the  day  a 
committee  of  gentlemen  from  Alfred  waited  upon  Mrs.  Howe,  with  a  set 
of  lengthy  resolutions,  to  the  effect  that  they  had  no  objections  to  her 
upon  personal  grounds.  This  must  have  been  a  great  comfort  to  Mrs. 
Howe.  Let  us  hope  she  still  has  these  resolutions,  to  cheer  and  comfort 
her  declining  years. 

"  The  following  day  Mrs.  Howe  went  to  Alfred,  where  she  made  a  short 
visit.  A  reception  was  given  by  President  and  Mrs.  Allen,  to  which 
students  and  townspeople  were  invited.  Her  learning  and  culture 
exacted  the  admiration  of  the  old,  while  the  hearts  of  the  young  were 
captured  by  her  quick  sympathies  and  sweet,  womanly  ways.  A  pleasing 
incident  of  the  afternoon  was  the  singing,  at  President  Allen's  request,  of 
the  '  Battle  Hymn  of  the  Republic,'  with  Mrs.  Howe  at  the  piano. 

"Thus  ended  what  is  known  in  the  history  of  the  school  as  the  Julia 
Ward  Howe  Controversy.  The  following  July  Mrs.  Howe  published  an 
account  of  it  in  the  Old  and  Neiv  under  the  title  of  'A  Midsummer  Idyl.' 
A  few  years  later  a  member  of  the  committee  met  Mrs.  Howe  in  Boston. 
She  referred  to  the  controversy,  and  then  asked,  'And  President  Allen,  is 
he  still  at  Alfred?'  The  remarks  which  followed  showed  that  in  her 
short  acquaintance  she  had  recognized,  under  the  quiet,  dignified  demeanor, 
something  of  the  man  he  was.  President  Allen  possessed  true  greatness. 
Only  those  who  knew  him  best  knew  his  worth,  and  they  stood  too  near 
to  see  his  greatness." 

Rev.  E.  M.  Dunn  says: — 

"Among  the  pleasant  things  I  remember  of  President  Allen  were  his 
readiness  to  counsel  and  talk  freely  with  the  students  who  came  to  con- 
sult him;  his  admiration  and  study  of  nature;  his  love  for  and  sympa- 
thy with  children ;  the  hope  he  inspired  in  young  women  as  well  as  young 
men  that  they  might  count  for  something  in  the  world;  his  freedom  from 
ambition  to  be  accounted  great  in  the  world;  his  modesty;  his  correct 
literary  tastes;  his  innocent  humor." 


MEMORIES    FROM    OLD    STUDENTS.  I9I 

Christie  Skinner  Kruson  writes  : — 

"President  Allen's  great  soul  had  every  window  open  to  the  sunshine, 
and  in  his  many-sidedness  he  was  able  to  catch  the  supreme  effulgence  of 
the  beautiful,  the  good,  the  wholesome,  and  the  inspiring,  and  to  speed 
invigorating  power  in  every  hfe  that  came  in  contact  with  his.  He  had 
so  rare  a  faculty  of  inspiring  his  students  with  higher  ambitions,  and 
more  Christlike  living,  that  to  be  with  him  was  to  absorb  a  grander  ideal 
and  a  broader  charity  for  all  mankind. 

"One  of  President  Allen's  special  delights  was  to  arouse  a  love  of 
-nature  in  the  minds  of  his  students.  He  thoroughly  believed  that  the 
man  or  woman  who  loves  the  'earth  and  the  fullness  thereof '  cannot  have 
a  large  space  left  for  evil  in  his  thoughts,  and  so  he  lost  no  opportunity  of 
inculcating  in  the  lives  of  those  about  him  an  appreciation  of  nature's 
beauties  and  immeasurable  resources.  All  old  students,  if  asked  what 
was  the  most  profitable  training  they  received  when  at  Alfred,  would 
with  one  accord  answer,  *To  follow  the  footsteps  of  the  Master.'  The 
principles  he  implanted  will  be  transmitted  through  untold  generations, 
and,  as  true  as  the  sun's  own  work,  there  will  go  on  from  his  life  a  blessed 
influence  through  all  time." 

Susie  M.  Burdick  says: — 

"President  Allen  was  a  part  of  the  atmosphere  which  I  breathed. 
From  my  earliest  recollection  he  was  president  of  Alfred  University  until 
I  left  Alfred,  and  I  cannot  imagine  the  place  without  him.  I  realize  that 
I  am  indebted  to  him  in  more  ways  than  it  would  be  possible  to  tell. 
Since  I  have  lived  in  China  I  have  come  to  thihk  of  some  of  his  charac- 
teristics more  than  ever  before,  for  instance,  his  forbearance  and  patience 
with  students.  How  he  would  suffer  long,  still  never  lose  his  faith  that 
sometime,  somehow,  the  delinquent  would  come  to  his  better  self!  The 
thought  of  this  has  often  helped  me  much  under  very  trying  circum- 
stances. 

"Again,  how  he  gave  himself  over  and  over  again !  Dear  Mary  Bailey 
once  told  me,  with  tears  in  her  eyes,  of  the  time  when  she  and  others  of 
the  family  were  ill  with  typhoid  fever;  while  nearly  everyone  else  was 
fearful  and  rather  deserted  them.  President  Allen  came  and  cared  for 
them  night  and  day.  Many  others  could  tell  a  similar  story.  I  hold 
him  in  loving  remembrance  now,  and  as  the  years  bring  added  burdens 
and  experience,  my. love  and  respect  for  him  will  doubtless  increase." 


192  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

Judge  and  Mrs,  Solon  O.  Thatcher  write: — 
"  It  is  a  long  time  since  we  studied  mental  philosophy  together  under 
the  genial  and  quickening  presence  of  Professor  Allen.  During  all  the 
following  years  we  have  talked  of  the  wonderful  influence  he  exercised 
over  his  pupils,  and  the  wide  comprehension  he  had  of  the  duties  and 
cares  that  would  come  upon  them  in  their  future  lives.  There  is  no 
pursuit  in  life  where  the  man  can  so  completely  transfuse  himself  into  the 
thoughts  and  character  of  others,  as  that  of  the  teacher.  It  was  Pro- 
fessor Allen's  happy  lot  to  stamp  his  own  sweet  and  pure  life  upon  the 
purposes  and  hopes  of  thousands  of  young  men  and  women.  Through 
them  his  life  will  move  on  in  ever-widening  circles  of  beneficence  and 
usefulness.  We  are  more  than  glad  to  bear  our  testimony  to  the  nobil- 
ity, the  purity,  the  sweetness  of  his  character  as  a  teacher,  a  friend,  and 
a  companion.  He  carried  into  Alfred  University  what  Matthew  Arnold 
says  Stanley  bore  to  venerable  Westminster  Abbey: — 

"  '  Bright  wits  and  instinct  sure, 

And  goodness  warm,  and  truth  without  alloy, 
And  temper  sweet,  and  love  of  all  things  pure. 
And  joy  in  light,  and  power  to  spread  the  joy.'  " 

From  Honorable  W.  W.  Brown: — 

"No  death  outside  my  own  kindred  has  ever  come  to  my  heart  with 
such  poignant  sorrow.  President  Allen  was  my  ideal  and  my  inspira- 
tion; I  never  achieved  a  success,  or  'lost  a  battle,'  but  his  image  was 
before  me.  As  when  in  boyhood  I  was  wont  to  say, '  How  will  it  please? 
and  what  will  mother  say  ?  '  so  in  my  manhood  Jonathan  Allen,  my 
beloved  teacher,  was  my  never-failing  mentor.  By  his  catholic  mind  and 
charitable  heart  I  was  always  too  generously  judged.  In  him  I  had  a 
friend,  constant  and  confiding,  far  beyond  my  deserving.  Sometimes  his 
confidence  in  and  love  for  me  were  embarrassing,  for  I  felt  that  some  day 
he  must  know  I  was  unworthy  of  such  bestowal. 

"  From  the  hour  he  first  greeted  me  as  his  pupil,  I  had  higher  aims 
and  better  purposes  in  my  heart.  His  life  was  in  the  highest  and  best 
sense  a  success.  His  memory  will  be  an  unceasing  benediction  to  all 
who. came  within  the  range  of  his  imperial  presence." 

From  Rev.  A.  Purdy: — 

"  When  making  my  choice  of  elective  studies  the  last  term  in  order 
to  graduate,  I  chose  another  study  instead  of  botany.  Professor  Allen 
said,  in  his  good-natured  way,  T  would  not  give  much  for  a  man  who  did 


MEMORIES    FROM    OLD    STUDENTS.  1 93 

not  love  flowers  and  could  not  see  in  them  the  beautiful  of  the  Creator.' 
"  I  always  enjoyed  his  classes,  for  the  food  he  gave  us  outside  the  text- 
books. The  geological  chart  he  made,  compiling  the  materials  from 
forty-two  different  authors  on  botany  and  geology,  I  showed  to  Professor 
Winchell,  at  Ann  Arbor,  who  said,  'Professor  Allen  could  immortalize 
himself  with  that  chart  if  he  would  give  it  to  the  world,  for  it  is  the  most 
complete  of  anything  extant.' 

"  He  gave  me  more  of  the  true  ideal  of  a  man — a  Christian  gentle- 
man— than  any  other  one  I  ever  knew,  and  that  at  the  formative  age  of 
my  young  manhood." 

Professor  George  Scott  writes:— 

"  President  Allen  was  noted  for,  first,  his  splendid  physique.  He  was 
a  prince  among  men.  His  appearance  anywhere  at  once  won  him  favor 
and  gave  the  impression  of  a  man  of  eminence, 

"Second,  his  intellectual  strength.  He  was  one  of  the  strongest  men 
I  have  ever  met.  He  never  paraded  his  learning,  yet,  in  polish,  in  grace, 
in  oratory,  as  a  deep  original  thinker,  he  had  few  equals. 

"  Third,  his  fine  soul  qualities.  An  Elijah  in  moral  courage,  he  was 
a  Moses  in  meekness.  The  most  indigent  or  dullest  student  always  met 
with  as  gracious  a  reception,  and  received  his  best  counsel,  as  heartily  as 
the  richest,  or  the  one  most  highly  endowed  with  nature's  gifts.  He  was 
the  impersonation  of  dignity  without  haughtiness.  He  ruled  men  by 
love,  and  by  inspiring  in  them  a  sense  of  self-respect.  Never  did  a  col- 
lege president  more  completely  fill  his  place  than  did  Dr.  Allen. 

"But  the  moral  quality  in  his  nature  that  impressed  itself  most 
strongly  upon  me  was  his  spirit  of  self-sacrifice.  His  sermons  on  this 
topic  were  inimitable.  No  man's  preaching  on  this  topic  ever  affected 
me  as  did  his.  It  was  because  his  whole  life  was  a  sacrifice.  He  gave 
himself  for  others. 

"Through  trials  innumerable,  through  discouragements  without  num- 
ber, when  the  outlook  at  Alfred  was  the  darkest,  when  he  might  have 
saved  himself  by  accepting  a  lucrative  position,  for  many  such  were 
offered  him,  he  stood  firm  to  his  sense  of  duty.  He  was  ready  to  go 
down  with  the  ship,  but  never  to  desert  her.  And  he  triumphed.  Stand- 
ing on  deck  of  the  craft  he  had  commanded  so  long,  his  ship  repaired  and 
strengthened,  gliding  over  the  quiet  waters  with  sails  outspread,  the 
noble  soul  looked  up  and  zuas  not,  for  God  had  taken  him. 

"  But  he  still  lives,  and  will  live  as  long  as  the  thousands  who  have 


13 


194  ^-^^^    O^'"    ^'RESIDENT    ALLEN. 

been  his  pupils  and  friends  are  permitted  to  cherish  his  memory.     I  never 
expect  to  have  another  such  a  teacher,  colaborer,  adviser,  and  friend." 

From  Rev.  L.  C.  Rogers: — 

"  Passing  by  the  many  shining  virtues  of  his  character,  we  may  say 
that  the  one  potent  factor  of  his  Hfe  was  the  sunHt  diamond  of  excellence, 
viz.,  his  prevailing  spirit  of  self-sacrifice.  He  lived  for  others'  good. 
He  was  self-forgetful;  and  from  the  point  of  view  of  our  common  lives, 
he  was  self- forgetful  almost  to  a  fault.  Like  other  men.  President  AUeri 
had  his  faults,  no  doubt,  but  this  characteristic  could  not  be  one  of  them. 
A  Christlike  spirit  of  self-sacrifice  was  to  him  as  the  atmosphere  he  lived 
in  from  day  to  day.  He  did  not,  however,  seem  conscious  of  this;  he 
simply  delighted  to  do  good.  It  was  his  happiness  to  look  after  and  labor 
for  the  well  being  of  others.  It  filled  his  heart  with  heaven's  sunshine. 
He  knew  full  well  the  secret  of  this  higher,  diviner  life;  he  trod  this  royal 
highway,  trodden  by  few,  but  these  the  noblest  of  earth's  sons  and  daugh- 
ters, led  by  the  chiefest  of  ten  thousands,  the  immaculate  Son  of  God. 
President  Allen  loved  all  mankind.  He  was  a  lover  of  man  as  man,  as  a 
creature  of  God,  and  entitled  to  consideration  as  such,  regardless  of  all 
adventitious  circumstances,  such  as  birth  and  fortune." 


S  E:  Fi  Nl  O ISJ  s 


SERMONS 


GOD    IM    ALL,    ALL    IM    GOD. 

[Baccalaureate  sermon,  preached  before  the  graduating  class  of  Alfred  University, 
June  19,  1892.*] 

ACTS   17:28:    "For    in   him   we    live,  and   move,   and   have  our 
being;  as  certain  also  of  your  own  poets  have  said,  For  we  are 
^^  also  his  offspring." 
^^ —  Paul    founded    his    doctrine  of  man's    being,  life,  and 

movement  in  God,  on  the  all-comprehending  doctrine  that  man  is  his 
offspring,  as  also  taught  certain  of  the  Greek  poets,  Arantus,  Cleanthes, 
and  others.  By  this  divine  fatherhood,  God  is  the  originator  of  man 
spiritually  from  his  own  nature,  in  his  own  miage,  after  his  own  likeness. 
As  the  image  and  likeness  of  the  earthly  parent  are  reproduced  in  the 
child,  not  so  much  in  the  physical  as  in  the  inner  and  more  essential 
nature,  of  which  the  outward  or  physical  is  but  a  faint  expression,  so  the 
image  and  likeness  of  God  in  man  are  not  in  his  animal,  but  in  his  spir- 
itual nature,  and  in  the  attributes  of  this  nature.  As  like  can  beget  like 
and  like  only,  whatever  is  the  essential  nature  of  God,  the  Father,  such 
must  be  the  essential  spirit  nature  of  man,  the  child.  This  fatherhood 
of  God  and  this  sonship  of  man  is  the  core  of  human  existence,  deter- 
mining the  nature  of  this  exi.stence,  in  the  individual  and  in  the  race,  and 
its  relations  to  God,  as  revealed  in  the  Bible,  in  human  consciousness,  in 
Providence,  and  in  redemption. 

This  divine  relationship  has  been  recognized  and  taught  in  all  times, 
by  the  foremost  men  and  the  foremost  peoples.  The  Hindu  Vedas  pray 
"May  the  Father  of  men  be  merciful  to  us."  Homer  calls  him  "the 
mo.st  great  and  glorious  Father."  Hesiod,  "the  Father  of  gods,  and 
men."     Plato  taught  the    divine   sonship  of   man.      Horace  styled    him 


*The  revision  of  the  manuscript  of  this  sermon  was  the  last  work  President  Allen 
ever  did.  It  was  brought  to  him  at  his  request  after  he  had  become  too  ill  to  rise 
from  his  chair.     He  said  that  it  embodied  his  system  of  theology. 

(   199) 


200  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

"the  Father  and  Guardian  of  the  human  race;"  Seneca,  "the  glorious 
Parent,  preparing  the  good  man  for  himself."  Isaiah  declared  him 
"the  Everlasting  Father."  Malachi  asks,  "Have  we  not  all  one  Father  ?" 
The  Talmud  taught  that  "men  are  the  children  of  their  Father  who  is  in 
heaven."  Jesus  based  his  mission  and  teaching  on  this  divine  relation- 
ship, instructing  all  men  to  pray,  "  Our  Father,  which  art  in  heaven."  A 
favorite  and  oft-repeated  doctrine  with  Paul  was  that  of  God,  the  Father 
of  the  Christ  and  of  all  men. 

From  this  oneness  of  nature  with  God  springs  the  ever-present  con- 
sciousness of  his  presence.  Humanity  in  all  stages  of  development  is 
more  or  less  conscious  of  this  perpetual  and  all-pervasive  presence,  as 
the  source  of  its  being,  and  in  which  it  lives  and  acts,  and  in  which  all 
existences  have  their  origin. 

Wordsworth  says: — 

"  I  have  felt 
A  presence  that  disturbs  me  with  the  joy 
Of  elevated  thoughts;  a  sense  sublime 
Of  something  far  more  deeply  interfused, 
Whose  dwelling  is  the  light  of  setting  suns, 
And  the  round  ocean,  and  the  living  air, 
And  the  blue  sky,  and  in  the  mind  of  man, 
A  motion  and  a  spirit  that  impels 
All  thinking  things,  all  objects  of  all  thought." 

Another  poet  says: — 

"  No!  such  a  God  my  worship  may  not  win. 
Who  lets  the  world  about  his  finger  spin. 
And  whom  I  own  for  Father,  God,  Creator, 
Holds  nature  in  himself,  himself  in  nature. 
And,  in  his  kindly  arms  embraced,  the  whole 
Doth  live  and  move  by  this  pervading  soul." 
Man  does  not  come  to  this  God  assurance  by  logical  induction  or 
deduction.     It  is  deeper,  more  pervasive  and  convincing,  than  all  demon- 
stration.    Man,  consciously  conditioned  as  relative,  finite,  imperfect,  and 
dependent,  spontaneously  and  intuitively  coroUates  himself  to  a  Being, 
apprehended  as  absolute,  infinite,  and  perfect.     This  apprehension  springs 
clear,  di.stinct,  and   positive,  in    the  human  consciousness,  though    the 
nature  and  attributes  of  this  being  may  be  incomprehensible  in  their  full- 
ness   and    completeness.     Although    these    intuitions    cannot   be    ade- 
quately expressed    in    the  limiting   terms   of  the  finite,  yet  man  never 
thinks    more    positively,    vigorously,    and    consistently    than     in    these 
intuitions. 

The  steepest,  loftiest  summit  towards  which  the  human  reason  moves 


SERMONS.  20 1 

in  these  intuitions  is  that  of  personaHty,  self-conscious,  self-originant,  and 
spontaneous,  self-determinant,  and  free.  In  this  upward,  lofty  move- 
ment, the  reason  demands  and  finds  an  absolute,  infinite,  and  perfect  per- 
sonality. Man's  spiritual  nature,  in  its  wants  and  aspirations,  demands 
and  finds,  through  his  faith  faculty,  as  insight,  or  "vision,"  as  Plato  terms 
it,  a  living  God,  as  supreme  Father,  graciously  and  freely  relating  him- 
self to  his  children  in  mutual  communion  and  love.  The  personality  of 
man  has  its  source  in  the  personality  of  God,  and  is  the  ground  of  the 
relationship  between  them.  The  more  clearly  the  human  personality  is 
developed,  the  more  assured  to  man  is  the  divine' personality. 

What,  then,  is  the  common  nature  of  this  personality,  whereby  God 
is  able  to  reveal  himself  to  man,  man  is  able  to  apprehend  God  and  to 
hold  communion  with  him?  Christ  answers,  "God  is  a  spirit,"  and  seeks 
those  who  can  worship  him  in  their  spirit  natures.  Man,  as  partaker  of  this 
divine  spirit  nature,  possesses  capacity  for  both  right  knowing  and  right 
worship,  capacity  for  both  inter-communication  and  inter-communion- 
If  God  possesses  a  nature  or  attributes  other  than  man's,  then  man  must 
be  other  than  his  offspring,  and  man  cannot  know  God,  God  cannot 
reveal  himself  to  man.  By  this  oneness  of  nature  a  way  is  open  for  rev- 
elation, communion,  inspiration,  and  a  divine  indwelling  and  ingrowing. 

Religion  is  the  response  of  the  human  spirit  to  this  consciousness  of 
God,  inducing  to  the  seeking  of  "the  Lord,  if  haply  they  might  feel  after 
him,  and  find  him,  though  he  be  not  far  from  every  one  of  us."  All 
religions  thus  seelc,  though,  it  may  be — 

"  Groping  blindly  in  tlie  darkness, 
Touch  God's  right  hand  in  tliat  darkness, 
And  are  lifted  up  and  strengthened." 

Religion  thus  involves  a  reciprocal  relation.  God  is  active  towards 
man.  Man  is  responsively  active  towards  God.  Religion  is  thus  not 
only  reciprocal  relation  but  also  reciprocal  activity  between  God  and 
man.  God  seeks  man,  man  in  turn  seeks  God.  This  univer.sal  religious 
impulse,  this  universal  feeling  after  God,  is  the  prerequisite  and  neces- 
sary condition  for  the  coming  of  the  kingdom  of  God.  All  ethnic  reli- 
gions are  a  prophecs'  of,  and  a  preparation  for,  this  coming. 

More  comprehensive  still,  all  nature  is  a  prophecy  of,  and  a  prepara- 
tion for,  the  same.  It  is  a  gradual  self-manifestation  of  the  "indwelling 
God,"  up  through  all  the  lower  stages  to  humanity.  It  is  the  outcome 
of  the  same  Being  that  breathes  by  his  Spirit  life  into  man.  Thus,  in  the 
spirit  of  man,  God  meets  his  own  nature  and  image,  and  the  realization 
of  a  life    and    type    that    partake    more    fully  of  the    divine.     Creation 


202  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

sprang  from  chaos  and  grew  to  a  cosmos,  with  man  as  its  summit  and 
crown,  with  his  Hfe  in  God.  Even  the  would-be  agnosticism  of  science 
is  compelled  to  grant  that  all  force  must  spring  from  force,  all  power 
from  power,  all  life  from  life,  all  soul  from  soul,  all  spirit  from  spirit; 
hence,  there  must  be  mind,  personality,  as  the  source  of  all. 

But  beyond  and  still  higher  than  this  the  trend  is  still  upward,  from  a 
lower  to  a  higher  type  in  man,  and  from  this  higher  type  to  the  Christ. 
All  peoples  have  manifested  this  tendency  in  a  longing  for,  and  expect- 
ancy of,  someone  in  whose  spirit  the  grace  of  a  higher  life,  and  the  shin- 
ing of  a  diviner  nature,  was  embodied  and  manifested;  someone  great 
and  divine  enough  to  realize  the  type  of  a  Godlike  man,  to  whom  they 
could  render  boundless  admiration  and  heartfelt  worship;  someone  to 
open  the  way  for  a  clearer  knowledge  of  God  and  a  closer  walk  and  freer 
communion  with  him;  someone  who  should  exemplify  the  divinity  in 
human  nature,  and  the  divine  significancy  in  life.  The  coming  of  a  God- 
man  has  been  the  expectancy  of  human  history.  This  has  led  to  the 
seizing  with  eager  joy  upon  a  man  larger,  grander,  nobler  than  the  com- 
mon type,  and  lifting  him  to  a  hero,  demi-god,  son  of  God,  and  reverencing 
him  accordingly.  It  has  been  well  said  that  every  night  since  man  left 
the  Garden  of  Eden  he  has  been  looking  into  the  throbbing  heavens  for 
the  star  of  the  East. 

Add  to  this  the  common  consciousness  of  sin,  and  the  felt  need  of  a 
mediator  whereby  pardon  and  reconciliation,  which  have  led  humanity 
to  seek  after  one  as  a  spiritual  Healer  and  Restorer,  one  who  could  lift  and 
lead  it  up  to  its  first  estate.  To  this  end  have  all  altars  been  erected 
and  sacrifices  burned.  The  world  has  never  been  without  struggling, 
praying,  climbing,  self-denying  souls,  finer  types  of  humanity,  in  its  twi- 
light gi"oping  after  a  Redeemer  and  a  redemption.  In  the  Christ  this 
spiritual  twilight  brightens  into  a  radiant  dawn,  as  he  takes  his  place  at 
the  head  of  humanity  and  leads  up  into  the  kingdom  of  heaven  on  earth. 
In  him  is  satisfied  the  demand  for  the  incarnation  of  the  divine  in  the 
human.  On  the  part  of  God,  self-manifestation  is  an  inherent  tendency 
of  his  being,  as  shown  in  creation,  in  the  nature  of  man,  in  Christ,  in  the 
procession  of  the  Spirit — a  perpetual  outpouring  of  his  fullness.  On  the 
part  of  man  there  is  a  perpetual  want — want  of  the  world,  on  his  animal 
side,  a  want,  a  yearning  for  the  divine,  on  his  spiritual  side.  Each  seeks 
the  other.  The  union  is  realized  in  Christ.  The  continuous  indwelling 
of  the  divine  in  the  human  is  realized  in  the  spirit.  In  the  beginning 
was  the  Word,  the  ever-present  type  of  all  that  is  noble,  lofty,  and  holy 
in   human   history,  foreshadowing  the  incarnation.      In   Christ  the  Word 


SERMONS.  20 

became  flesh,  with  a  larger  bestowing  of  the  divine  life  upon  the  world, 
uplifting  man  into  a  fuller  sharing  of  the  indwelling  God,  to  the  expand- 
ing and  perfecting  of  humanity.  A  higher  type  is  thus  added  by  an  ele- 
vation into  a  higher  spiritual  kingdom,  through  a  higher  and  diviner 
man,  filled  with  a  larger  measure  of  the  indwelling  God,  insomuch  that 
God  thus  inspheres  himself  in  humanity  in  the  God-man,  the  Christ,  the 
Immanuel,  in  whom  dwells  the  divine  fullness,  becoming  thus  more  com- 
pletely both  son  of  man  and  son  of  God. 

The  Christ  thus  came  for  the  spiritual  renewal  of  the  world,  thus  ful- 
filHng  the  desire  and  hope  of  all  peoples,  carrying  up  the  spiritual  life  of 
the  race  to  its  fullness  and  completeness  in  God,  the  culmination  and 
crown  intended  from  the  beginning,  and  towards  which  the  whole  crea- 
tion has  ever  moved,  in  which  all  history  is  fulfilled.  This  coming  of  the 
Christ  is  the  epoch  in  the  continuous  revelation  to  the  end  that  through 
him  all  things  created  by  and  for  him  might  be  spiritualized  and  glori- 
fied, and  in  whom  redeemed  humanity  is  lifted  to  a  higher  plane  of 
development,  living  no  longer  for  the  world,  but  for  the  kingdom  of 
heaven  on  earth,  inaugurated  by  Christ. 

"  Where  the  silver  Jordan  runneth  from  the  Lake  of  Galilee, 
A  narrow  kingdom  lies  between  the  mountains  and  the  sea; 
From  the  hillsides  red  with  vineyards  the  gentle  Syrian  wind 
Bore  the  only  voice  responsive  to  the  sobbing  of  mankind, 
To  the  cottage  of  the  fisher,  to  the  poor  man's  mean  abode, 
The  desire  of  nations  came,  the  Incarnate  God." 

For  this  redemption  of  man  Christ  became  the  God-man.  The 
atonement, lite  rally  at-one-ment,  effected  by  Christ,  was  through  joint 
participation  of  both  the  divine  and  the  human,  the  divine- human. 
Together  as  one  the  divine  and  the  human  lived,  suffered,  died,  rose  from 
the  dead,  ascended  on  high.  Through  the  first  Adam  humanity  fell  from 
its  estate,  through  the  second  Adam  it  was  again  restored — potentiall}- 
restored  to  all,  actually  restored  to  everyone  accepting  this  redemption. 
This  divine-human  Adam  effected  this  restoration  by  the  realization  of  a 
perfect  life  in  humanity,  through  a  conflict  with  and  a  conquest  over  all 
the  forces  alien  to  God  and  man,  and  by  a  complete  fulfillment  of  all 
righteousness,  of  love  and  mercy  and  forgiveness,  and  thus  opening  the 
way  for  the  abiding  and  indwelling  of  the  divine  Spirit  in  humanity. 

This  imparting  of  the  Spirit  met  the  felt  need  of  the  race,  met  the 
universal  aspiration  for,  and  expectancy  of,  the  inspirations  of  the 
Almighty,  which  giveth  understanding,  illumination,  strength,  guidance, 
a  looking  for  inspired  men  as  revealers  of  divine  truth,  and  the  divine 
will  as  teachers  and    guides.     All  peoples  believed  that,  from  time  to 


204  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

time,  such  men  had  appeared  among  them.  Not  only  this,  but  all  fine 
spirits  felt  that  they  had  e.xperience  of  the  pressure,  light,  and  power  of 
this  Spirit. 

To  just  this  end  did  the  Christ  promise  the  Comforter  that  all  who 
desire  might  have  the  indwelling  presence.  As  the  atmosphere  envelopes 
the  earth,  as  heat  and  light  flood  and  warm  and  light  it,  as  gravitation 
pervades  and  attracts  every  atom,  so  the  divine  Spirit  pervades,  attracts, 
warms,  lights,  and  vivifies  the  spiritual  world.  Its  influence  is,  at  once, 
universal  and  particular.  It  comprehends  the  whole.  It  concenters  on 
each  one.  It  knocks  at  all  doors.  It  enters  every  opened  soul  and 
dwells  therein.  This  is  to  continue  till  the  natural  life  of  man  on  earth 
shall  end,  and,  for  the  redeemed,  perpetuated  in  divine  joys  and  heavenly 
glories. 

Paul  says,  "By  grace  are  ye  saved  through  faith," — grace  on  the  part 
of  God,  faith  on  the  part  of  man.  The  Spirit  is  everywhere  and  at  all 
times  pressing  man  to  open  the  door  of  his  heart  and  accept  this  divine 
grace.  When  man  does  this,  then  the  life  of  grace  begins  in  the  new 
birth,  regeneration,  re-ingenerated  with  the  divine  Ufe.  This  is  the 
re-vivification  of  the  original  spiritual  nature  of  man — the  nature  and 
image  of  God,  in  which  he  was  created.  The  new  birth,  as  Christ  taught 
Nicodemus,  was  a  necessity,  from  the  fact  that  that  which  is  born  of  the 
flesh  is  flesh  and  that  which  is  born  of  the  spirit  is  spirit.  It  is  a  spirit- 
ual, not  a  soulish  life,  that  comes  from  God  through  Christ  by  the  spirit, 
and,  through  faith,  received  by  man.  This  life  of  God  in  the  soul  is  the 
eternal,  or  spiritual,  life,  promised  to  all  who  shall  accept  Christ.  It 
unites  anew  the  human  with  the  divine,  as  the  branches  to  the  vine,  as 
Christ  taught,  insomuch  that  the  partaker  is  no  longer  human,  but 
divine-human. 

This  divine  life  in  the  soul  is,  like  all  life,  a  growing  principle. 
Divine  truth  is  the  vital  light,  the  vital  food  of  the  spirit.  What  sunlight 
is  to  the  vegetable  world,  what  food  is  to  the  animal  world,  this  truth  is 
to  the  spiritual  world.  The  growth  thereby  produces  the  fruits  of  the 
Spirit, — knowledge,  temperance,  patience,  love,  joy,  long-suffering,  gen- 
tleness, goodness,  faith,  meekness,  godliness,  brotherly  kindness,  charity. 
This  living  and  growing  energy  of  divine  truth  gives  strength,  beaut)-, 
dignity,  worthiness,  and  spiritual  freedom,  that  lifts  the  possessor  above 
all  the  enslaving  forces  of  the  world.  This  freedom  is  above  all  earthly 
liberties  and  privileges.  With  it  all  these  are  useless.  Without  it  all 
these  are  vain.  With  it  comes  the  peaceful  flow  of  life,  with  the  absence 
or  conquest  of  every  ignoble  fear  and  worry,  amid  .po\erty,  disease,  suf- 
fering, even  in  the  very  valley  of  the  shadow  of  death. 


SERMONS.  205 

Man  thereby  becomes  a  fit  member  of  the  spiritual  society  com- 
posing the  commonwealth  of  Christ,  the  kingdom  of  heaven.  Citizen- 
ship in  this  kingdom  comes  not  through  racial,  national,  or  any  other 
earthly  relationships,  but  may  be  attained  to  by  every  human  being 
through  his  birthright  as  a  child  of  the  common  heavenly  F"ather,  pro- 
vided there  be  added  to  this  common  birthright  certain  voluntary  spir- 
itual qualifications.  Christ  announces  these  qualifications  in  his  inaugural 
sermon  on  the  mount. 

Blessed  are  the  poor  in  spirit,  the  mourner,  the  meek,  the  hungering 
and  thirsting  after  righteousness,  the  merciful,  the  pure  in  heart,  the 
peace  makers,  the  persecuted  for  righteousness'  sake  and  for  Christ's 
sake. 

These  are  the  fit  candidates  for  this  society,  fit  subjects  for  this 
kingdom,  wherever  found,  coming  from  whatever  race  or  nation.  These 
are  to  constitute  the  new  and  spiritual  brotherhood,  the  new  republic  of 
Christ,  wherein  all  have  equal  rights,  the  rights  of  loyalty,  devotion,  self- 
surrender,  service,  and  sacrifice,  whereby  the  royal  law  of  Christ  is  ful- 
filled in  bearing  one  another's  burdens.  In  this  republic  this  law  is  not 
to  be  enforced  or  regulated  by  a  "  thou  shalt,"  or  "  shalt  not,"  but  fulfilled 
by  becoming  a  glad  service  through  the  inspirations  of  the  Spirit,  secur- 
ing thereby  willing  devotement  through  love  to  God  and  man. 

Thus  the  freedom  coming  with  this  citizenship  is  not  a  lawless 
freedom.  The  supreme  behest  regulating  this  freedom  is  service  to  God 
and  service  to  man.  The  supreme  motive  impelling  to  this  service  is 
love  to  God  and  love  to  man.  Such  service  thus  motived  becomes  the 
chief  activity  of  each  and  every  citizen  of  this  kingdom.  The  mutual 
service,  each  of  all,  and  all  of  each,  and  all  of  God,  through  Christ,  in  the 
Spirit,  impelled  by  love,  is  not  only  right  demanded  by  the  supreme  law 
of  this  kingdom,  but  also  a  joy. 

This  is  the  refrain  of  the  music  heard  by  the  watching  shepherds  on 
the  hills  of  Bethlehem  from  choiring  angels,  as  they  proclaimed  peace 
on  earth  and  good  will  to  men,  and  the  triumphant  strains  heard  by  the 
Revelator  before  the  throne,  saying,  "Salvation  to  our  God  which  sitteth 
on  the  throne  and  unto  the  Lamb." 

"  Love,  which  is  the  sunlight  of  peace, 
Age  by  age  to  increase. 
Till  anger  and  hatred  are  dead, 
And  war  and  want  shall  cease  ; 
Peace  on  earth  and  good  will ; 
Souls  that  are  gentle  and  still 
Hear  the  first  music  of  this 
Far-off,  infinite  bliss." 


2o6  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

The  Christ  says,  "  Behold,  the  kingdom  of  God  is  within  you." 
Paul  says,  "Know  ye  not  that  ye  are  the  temple  of  God,  and  that  the 
Spirit  of  God  dwelleth  in  you?"  This  indwelling  Spirit  and  kingdom 
are  not  to  be  waited  for  as  something  in  the  future,  but  are  here  and  now 
to  every  true  believer.  The  eternal  life,  the  life  of  the  Spirit  in  the  soul, 
that  constitutes  one  a  citizen  and  partaker  of  this  kingdom,  is  not  con- 
ditioned on  the  here  or  the  hereafter,  on  the  limitations  of  time  or  place. 
It  transcends  all  these  conditions  and  limitations.  Beginning  in  the 
individual,  it  goes  out  in  service  of  all. 

It  is  the  divine  image,  constituting  the  ideal  man  in  every  man,  that 
calls  for  love  and  service.  This  love  of  the  human,  as  such,  is  a  natural 
impulse.  The  Spirit  elevates  and  refines  this  impulse  into  spiritual  love 
all-embracing.  Philanthropy  is  the  generic  term,  comprehending  both 
the  spirit  and  the  work  of  those  indued  with  this  love  of  humanity.  True 
philanthropy  not  only  relieves  want  and  suffering,  but  also  seeks  to  pre- 
vent them  by  improving  human  conditions.  It  still  further  seeks  to  lift 
and  build  mankind  into  a  state  of  spiritual  health,  growth,  freedom,  and 
good  will,  and,  guided  by  the  spirit  of  mercy,  it  especially  seeks  the 
fallen,  degraded,  the  outcast — all  lost  sheep.  The  kingdom  of  heaven, 
established  by  Christ,  is  governed  by  this  love,  seeking  all  good  possible 
to  all.  Although  this  ideal  has  not  as  yet  been  realized,  we  are  instructed 
to  pray,  "Thy  kingdom  come,"  wherein  it  shall  be  realized. 

The  ultimate  end  of  all  this  is  to  make  man  godlike,  by  having 
Christ  through  the  Spirit  dwelling  within,  till  all  come  in  unity  of  faith 
and  of  knowledge  unto  a  perfect  man,  "unto  the  measure  of  the  stature 
of  the  fullness  of  Christ,"  growing  up  into  him  in  all  things,  who  is  the 
head.  This  growing  Godward  through  Christ  by  the  Spirit  is  the  mission 
and  end  of  life  of  all  living.  This  is  the  high  ideal  set  before  all.  That 
which  determined  position  in  the  scale  of  humanity  is  the  energy  of  this 
ideal,  working  within  and  upon  us,  by  which  we  are  freed,  more  and 
more,  from  the  dominion  of  all  lower  and  selfish  ends. 

Thus  the  ideal  man,  as  the  ultimate  outcome,  is  to  be  divine  as  well 
as  human,  a  divine  human  personality,  by  and  with  the  indwelling  Spirit. 
A  perfect  divine  human  type  in  Christ  is  the  ideal  for  man,  and  the 
indwelling  Spirit  is  to  the  end  of  perfecting  the  same  in  him.  This  ideal 
thus  vitalized  acquires  an  attracting,  inspiring  power,  by  presenting  a 
divine  end  to  be  sought,  with  the  hope  of  perpetually  approaching  it, 
and,  though  never  completely  attained,  it  becomes  a  pillar  of  fire,  leading 
on  to  higher  and  .still  higher  attainments  in  spiritual  grace,  dignity,  and 
worth.     A  gradual  elevation  of  the  individual    and  of  society  is    thus 


SERMONS.  207 

effected.     New  and  nobler  practices  spring  up,  and  a  more  spiritual  tone 
and  atmosphere  prevail. 

This  perfection  of  being  is  the  essential  good,  and  is  in  harmony 
with  the  nature  of  this  being,  with  God,  and  with  universal  being,  and  is 
to  be  sought  for  self  and  all  being  as  the  true  good— true  worth  and 
worthiness.  Choosing  this  end  is  the  beginning  of  true  spiritual  char- 
acter. Love  to  God  and  man  is  the  essence  and  germ  of  such  choice, 
hence  of  such  character.  In  such  choosing  man  determines  all  his 
energies  and  possessions  to  the  service  of  God  and  man,  to  the  end  of 
universal  perfection,  and  thus  to  universal  good.  This  determining  can 
be  realized  only  by  living  and  doing  according  to  the  laws  governing  the 
perfection  of  univeral  being.  Man  is  not  an  isolated  individuality.  He 
cannot  \vork  out  his  best  good  regardless  of  the  good  of  all  dse.  He 
belongs  to  a  universal  system,  with  mutual  interdependencies,  intended 
to  work  together  to  universal  edification.  Each  one's  worth  in  this 
system  is  measured  by  his  consecration  to  this  universal  edification. 

This  constitutes  the  only  true  ideal,  as  an  end  to  be  sought  after  in 
all  living.  Christ  represents  this  ideal  for  all,  in  the  union  of  the  divine- 
human,  in  the  spirit,  grace,  and  perfectness  of  his  life,  in  his  love  of 
humanity,  in  his  coming,  not  to  be  ministered  unto  but  to  minister,  giving 
his  life  to  redeem  and  build  humanity  into  a  republic  of  righteousness 
and  good  will. 

This  ideal  thus  abides  with  humanity  through  all  its  struggles,  its 
reverses,  its  successes,  and  its  hopes,  to  the  end  of  perfecting  each  aiid 
all  in  grace,  beauty,  dignity,  and  worthiness.  To  this  same  end  the  min- 
istry of  the  Spirit  ever  abides  with  men;  to  this  end  was  the  kingdom  of 
heaven  established  among  men;  to  this  end  was  Christ  revealed  as  the 
perfect  type. 

One  accepting  these  divine  aids  ma)'  have  the  Spirit  as  the  light  of 
his  soul  and  the  inspiration  of  his  thoughts  and  deeds.  His  life  may 
be  the  life  of  the  Spirit,  tremulous  with  the  divine  sensibility,  and  calm 
in  the  peace  of  God.  His  purposes  may  be  responsive  to  the  divine  pur- 
poses. His  character  may  be  charactered  in  the  divine,  becoming  thus 
a  personality  worth)'  of  self-reverence  and  the  reverence  of  all  other  per- 
sonalities, made  sacred  by  the  indwelHng  Spirit. 

We  are  here  to  attain  all  these  qualities  of  sellhood,  character  that 
will  enrich  the  hereafter  through  their  perpetual  growth.  The  mastery 
of  self  and  the  attainment  of  true  manhood  are  to  be  sought  in  this  world, 
Avhere  temptation  and  sin  are  possible,  and  where  suffering  and  sorrow, 
as  well  as  joy,  abound;  but  these  hav^e  no  significance  if  the  end  be  noth- 


2o8  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN, 

incrness.  Only  in  the  power  of  an  endless  life,  perpetuated  in  a  realm 
moved  and  governed  by  influences  in  accord  with -the  divine  will  and 
purpose,  wherein  spiritual  growth  and  spiritual  power  perpetually 
increase,  have  they  significancy.  This  is  the  meaning  of  the  universe  in 
its  ultimate  outcome  and  fruitage.  This  is  the  only  end  which  satisfies 
reason,  science,  revelation,  faith,  hope — all  the  yearnings  and  aspirations 
of  humanity.  Only  this  is  commensurate  with  the  mighty  processes  of 
creation,  redemption,  and  the  divine  providences,  unfolded  in  human 
history.     The  image  and  nature  of  God  in  man  was  never  born  to  die. 

Thus  everything  has  been  and  is  working  together  to  one  great  end, 
the  development  of  the  most  exalted  spiritual  qualities  in  man,  begun 
here,  to  be  continued  in  the  hereafter.  As  God  is  ever  living,  ever  vivi- 
fying, so  his  children  are  ever  living,  thereby  giving  reasonableness  and 
significancy  to  all  that  has  been  done  for  man.  All  these  are  means,  not 
an  end.  The  end  is  a  perpetual  growth  unto  the  perfect  more  and  more, 
growth  Godward,  otherwise  all  is  meaningless.  To  one  growing  in  god- 
likeness  all  is  significant  and  ennobled. 

Responsive  to  all  these  there  is  an  assured  consciousness  within 
every  soul  as  being  in  a  state  of  confinement  and  thralldom.  There  is 
likewise  a  mysterious  longing  as  well  as  an  indefinable  assurance  of  a 
day  and  state  of  light  and  largeness  and  freedom  and  blessedness.  This 
life,  with  its  sense  of  incompleteness,  is  simply  a  state  of  preparation  for 
the  complete.  This  is  for  what  man  was  created  and  away  from  which 
he  cannot  rest.  The  spirit  turns  to  this  as  the  needle  to  the  pole.  All 
life  tends  in  this  direction.  Heaven  is  home  for  all  those  children  of  the 
heavenly  Father  who  are  prepared  for  it  in  earthly  homes,  the  nurseries 
of  the  heavenly.  The  beginning  and  end  of  life  is  home.  The  one  is  to 
prepare  for  the  other.  The  one  is  fleeting,  the  other  is  eternal,  unchang- 
ino-.  The  one  does  not  meet  all  the  soul's  needs  and  longings,  the 
other  does.  The  one,  with  its  imperfection,  is  the  foreshadowing  with 
glimpses  and  foretastes  of  the  perfections  of  the  other.  "  The  expectation 
of  the  creature,"  says  Paul,  "waiteth  for  the  manifestation  of  the  sons  of 
God."  Relief  and  rest  come  to  the  spirit  when  it  has  entered  into  full 
assurance  of  this. 

"  This  chain  of  love, 
Combining  all  below  and  all  above, 

For  which  bear  to  live,  or  dare  to  die. 
Whence  comest  ?    Whither  do  I  go  ? 
A  centered  self  which  feels  and  is, 
A  cry  between  silences," 

is  thus  answered  and  satisfied. 


SERMONS.  209 

Young  friends,  we  have  thus  outHned  what  God  has  made  you— a 
little  lower  than  the  angels — what  he  has  done  and  is  doing  for  you,  and 
the  divine  glories  to  which  you  are  called.  Account  it  the  highest  glory 
of  life  to  be  worked  for  and  won— this  of  being  welcomed  into  the  king- 
dom of  God,  and  into  the  affectionate  confidence  of  all  those  for  whom 
life  has  high  meaning  and  high  issues,  and  of  bemg  recognized  among 
the  subtle  and  beneficent  forces  of  the  world.  In  this  companionship 
and  in  this  work  all  earnest  effort  is  ever  fruitful.  More  noble  already 
they  who  learn  to  think  nobly  of  their  work.  Discipline  and  strength 
come  from  endurance  and  patience.  Defeat  does  not  sour  or  dishearten, 
nor  success  disturb  the  equipoise  gained  in  life's  experiences.  In  this 
present  actual  in  which  you  live,  here  or  nowhere  is  your  mission. 
Work  it  out  therefrom,  and  thus  working  you  will  have  true  life,  true 
freedom,  true  independency,  true  nobility.  Your  environments  are  the 
stuff  you  are  to  shape  your  ideal  life  out  of.  What  matters  it  whether 
such  stuff  be  of  this  or  that  sort,  so  the  form  and  quality  you  give  it  be 

heroic,  divine  ? 

"  Power  to  him  who  power  exerts, 
And,  like  thy  shadow,  follows  thee." 
Reinember  you  that  strength,  wisdom,  and  power  bear  with  them 
great  responsibilities.     Ability,  character,  influence,  are  trusts  with  which 
to  serve  the  world.     Use  them  with  integrity,  courage,  persistency,  with- 
out vanity  or  boasting.     Thus  there  will  spring  an  energy  ever  strong 
to  control  evil,  restrain    passion,  quick  to  direct  action,  shape  careers, 
mould  character.     So  live    as  to    raise   and   ennoble    the  idea  of  man, 
combining  such  strength,  beauty,  and  grace  as  to  inspire  in  others  self- 
reverence,  a.spiration,  thereby  awakening  undreamed-of  power  abiding  in 
simple  manhood,  free  and  independent,  and  the  sweet  and  sublime  sereni- 
ties of  a  self-forgetting  love  for  others. 
Then  can  be  announced: — 

"A  man  or  woman  coming, 
Perhaps  you  are  to  be  the  one, 

A  great  individual,  fluid,  chaste,  affectionate,  compassionate, 
A  life  that  shall  be  copious,  earnest,  spiritual,  bold, 
An  old  age  that  shall  lightly  and  joyfully  meet  its  translation." 
A  man  apart  from  other  men,  embodying  in  himself  much  of  the  majesty 
of  earth,  and  reflecting  in  his  life  foreglooms  of  the  glory  of  heaven,  his 
presence  a  perpetual  benediction. 

"  He  stands  a  man  now,  stately,  strong,  and  wise. 
One  great  aim,  like  a  guiding  star  before, 
Which  tasks  strength,  wisdom,  stateliness,  to  follow, 
So  shall  he  go  on  greatening  to  the  end — 
The  man  of  men." 
14 


2IO  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 


PROFESSIOMAL    OR    LIFE-LABOR. 
[Address  to  the  graduating  class  of  Alfred  Academy,  July  i,  1857.] 

Graduates:  A  parting  word  with  you  and  our  work  is  done.  The 
period  has  arrived  in  the  lives  of  many,  if  not  most  of  you,  when  you  are 
to  pass  from  preparation  to  action.  The  days  of  exclusive  study  are  now 
ended.  Henceforth  comes  the  toil  of  active  business  life  There  is  no 
longer  room  for  prospecting,  for  youthful  dreaming  of  future  activities. 
Now  and  henceforward  or  never  must  you  act — act  out  what  has  been 
acquired  in  school  life. 

It  is  well  if,  standing  thus  on  the  dividing  line  between  preparation 
and  action,  you  can  look  back  upon  your  preparatory  period  as  a  period 
bright  with  improved  opportunities,  rich  with  garnered  treasures  of  knowl- 
edge; then  you  can  look  to  a  future  bright  with  the  prospects  of  useful- 
ness, rich  with  the  rewards  of  success.  If  the  past  has  been  carefully 
husbanded,  as  the  seed  time  of  life,  the  future  will,  doubtless,  present  to 
the  reapings  of  age  an  abundant  harvest.  He  who  has  consecrated  all  to 
God,  resolving  to  make  the  most  of  the  powers  and  privileges  which  have 
been  given  him,  and  has  improved  the  past  accordingly,  will  enter  upon 
the  future  with  the  brightest  promises  of  religion  cheering  him  on,  and  at 
the  close  of  life  lifting  the  veil  that  hides  the  spirit  land  and  revealing  the 
joys  of  eternity.  Industry,  intelligence,  and  religion  will  ever  be  his  com- 
panions. Although  the  more  formal  period  of  preparation  is  past,  yet 
with  such  motives  and  f-esolves  you  will  continue  to  improve — do  and 
learn — learn  by  doing.  Submitting  yourselves  to  the  guidance  of  an 
overruling  Providence,  you  will  ever  strive  to  labor  in  harmony  with 
Deity,  being  ever  guided  by  his  laws  and  inspired  by  his  Spirit. 

Though  such  should  be  the  motive  power  and  guiding  principle  of 
each  of  your  lives,  though  you  must  all  have  a  common  center, and  draw 
your  inspirations  from  a  common  source,  yet  in  the  details  of  your  vari- 
ous pursuits  or  professions  there  may  and  doubtless  ought  to  be  a  wide 
and  varied  range.  It  shall  be  our  purpose,  then,  in  the  few  remaining 
words  we  speak  to  you,  to  consider  some  questions  appertaining  to  your 
professional  calling  or  life  labor. 

My  life  work — what  is  it?  Am  I  to  vegetate  like  the  vegetable — to 
feed  and  grow  like  an  animal — or  to  work,  and  think,  and  love,  and  live 
like  a  man?  Work,  evidentl}^  is  one  of  my  high  prerogatives.  If  so, 
what  kind  shall  it  be?  Shall  it  be  good  and  great — great  because  good? 
Was  work-power  given  me  without  a  work? — Evidently  not.  To  what 
particular  work,  then,  shall  my  life-power  be  dedicated  ?     Hitherward  and 


SERMONS.  211 

thitherward  I  look,  yet  am  unsatisfied.  This  sphere  is  too  contracted — 
that  work  too  one-sided.  One  calhng  is  too  superficial  or  frivolous — 
another  too  material  and  groveling.  Some  are  too  objective,  others  too 
subjective.  Now  the  bad  effects  trouble  me — the  moralit)-  of  the  pursuit, 
at  least  its  high  spiritual  tendency,  is  questionable.  Again,  the  means  are 
too  limited  for  the  object  sought. to  be  accomplished — the  foundation  too 
small  for  the  superstructure.  Give  me  a  work  for  which  I  am  prepared — 
adapted  to  my  nature,  and  for  which  it  longs — give  a  great  work,  a  good 
work,  a  genial  and  a  soul-satisfying  work,  and  I  am  content.  Such  are 
the  questionings  and  longings  of  every  soul  earnestly  seeking  its  life- 
labor. 

The  profession  or  pursuit  of  an  individual  is  the  footing,  the  place 
whereon  he  stands  and  helps  move  the  world.  It  forms  the  medium  of 
connection  between  the  individual  and  the  public.  It  gives  the  principal 
means  of  support,  and  also  a  means  by  which  he  may  work  outward, 
serving  and  blessing  thereby  humanity.  No  one  is  fully  prepared  to  take 
his  position  in  society  till  he  has  a  work,  and  a  place  where  that  work  is 
to  be  performed.  Until  then  he  will  be  vacillating,  discontented,  com- 
plaining, fault-finding.  A  person  without  a  trade  or  calling  is  pitiable 
indeed.  His  life  is  objectless.  His  aimless  endeavors  are  spasmodic.  He 
is  tossed  hither  and  thither,  in  the  eddyings  and  surgings,  in  the  winds 
and  tempests  of  life.  Seldom,  likewise,  can  one  be  a  person  of  all  trades. 
The  old  adage,  "Good  at  none,"  is  as  truthful  as  old.  It  is  rare,  indeed, 
that  one  possesses  that  many-sidedness  of  mind,  that  many-sidedness  of 
power,  which  will  enable  him  to  work  well  and  successfully  at  many  or 
diverse  trades.  It  is  seldom  that  even  Yankee  versatility  or  tact  can  win 
riches  or  renown  by  driving  many  trades  harnessed  abreast.  This  tend- 
ency is  the  prolific  source  of  quacks  and  quackery.  One  calling  well 
filled,  with  occasional  offshooting  labors  for  its  own  improvement,  or 
reaching  out  into  the  common  field  of  humanity,  where  everyone  is 
called  to  lend  a  helpmg  hand,  is  generally  all  for  which  the  time  and  tal- 
ent of  any  individual  are  sufificient.  Life  is  too  short  and  powers  too  feeble 
to  warrant  leisurely  ranging  among  many  or  diverse  pursuits. 

Granting  that  religion  is  the  all-pervading,  life-giving  principle  of  your 
lives— granting  that  you  are  consecrated  to  the  glory  of  God  and  the 
highest  well-being  of  humanity,  yet  the  choice  of  a  profession  through 
which  this  is  to  be  accomplished  is  one  of  the  most  difficult  and  impera- 
tive decisions  of  life.  Important  interests  and  consequences  cluster 
around  such  decisions — not  only  physical,  but  spiritual,  not  only  to  the 
individual,  but  to  society.     This  choice  has  to  be  made  by  the  inexperi- 


2  12  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

enced  youth,  assisted,  it  may  be,  by  the  counsel  and  caution  of  friends; 
yet  with  all  the  aids  possible,  the  determination  may  be  but  the  casting 
of  lots  in  respect  to  a  dim  uncertain  fatality. 

Adaptability  is  a  consideration  of  primal  importance  in  determining 
what  is  your  particular  life  labor.  Variety  amid  uniformity  is  enstamped 
upon  everything.  It  is  a  leading  law  of  nature.  With  a  few  simple 
elements  the  Deity  works  out  the  world's  wondrous  variety  of  utility 
and  loveliness.  It  buds  and  waves  in  plant  and  tree,  smiles  and  frowns 
in  sky  and  cloud,  feels,  moves,  and  palpitates  in  the  animal.  The  uni- 
formity of  genus  varies  in  species— species,  in  individuals.  In  the  physi- 
cal world  things  may  be  quite  alike  in  the  generals,  quite  unlike  in  the 
particulars. 

It  is  the  mission  of  some  to  rush  and  thunder  over  the  earth  like  the 
storm  cloud,  of  some  to  warm  and  inspire  like  a  tropical  sun — of  others 
to  shed  their  influence  like  a  gentle,  refreshing  rain — of  others  to  distill 
life  and  beauty  like  the  dew  of  a  midsummer  night.  Now  and  then, 
one,  like  the  palm,  stands  solitary  and  majestic  in  his  far-off  desert  home, 
reaching  out  his  hand  over  wide  wastes  of  sand  to  his  brother  palms. 

A  few,  like  the  gracefully  singing  pine  or  the  sturdy  mountain  oak, 
are  disciplined  and  cultured  by  a  thousand  storms.  Some  stand  in  the 
melancholy  dreaminess  of  the  weeping  willow;  others  thrill  with  the 
sensitiveness  of  the  trembling  poplar.  Some  are  meek  violets,  ever  look- 
ing confidingly  towards  heaven ;  some  are  creeping,  trailing  vines,  ever 
clinging  to  something  stronger  for  support ;  others  are  delicate  anemones, 
ever  shedding  around  themselves  an  ethereal  loveliness;  others  are  sweet 
eglantines,  ever  whispering  to  the  world  of  quiet  home  scenes  and  rural 
happiness.  No  amount  of  culture  can  ever  make  the  vine  to  stand  in 
majesty  and  strength,  like  the  oak  or  palm.  It  must  ever  continue  to 
perform  its  humble  office;  so  with  each  species;  so  with   human  spirits. 

Again,  every  profession  or  pursuit  which  is  for  the  good  of  society, 
for  the  development  and  progress  of  humanity,  is  useful,  is  necessary,  is 
honorable;  yet  in  respect  to  the  inherent  nobleness  or  dignity  of  pursuits, 
there  are  very  different  degrees. 

Those  which  tend  to  draw  out  and  give  culture  to  the  higher  pow- 
er-s  of  man,  to  call  into  activity  those  high  spiritual  influences  that 
control  and  guide  and  elevate  humanity,  are  the  nobler  pursuits  of  life. 
They  are  to  be  coveted  as  the  better  gifts.  Yet  capability  is  the  limit  to 
advancement.  Better  have  reserved  powers  than  to  work  beyond  your 
power.  Many  a  lower  station  has  been  deprived  of  a  good  occupant,  to 
supply  a  poor  one  for  a  higher  station.     Be  not  so  anxious  about  the 


SERMONS.  213 

height  of  }'oui-  spliere  as  that  it  ma\'  be  well  and  faithfully  filled.  Beg 
not  for  place.  Let  place  beg  for  you.  Better  to  be  asked  to  come  up 
higher  than  go  down  lower.  An  humble  work  well  done  is  better  than 
a  lofty  one  ill  done. 

Having  wisely  chosen  your  profession,  you  are,  by  it,  to  supply 
your  necessities,  secure  spiritual  growth,  and  benefit  others.  A  profession 
thus  chosen  is  to  be  your  medium  of  labor.  To  it  are  to  be  devoted 
your  chief  hours  and  efforts.  In  it  you  are  to  find  most  of  your  cares 
and  your  struggles  with  life.  Your  failures  or  successes  are  here  to  have 
their  chief  root. 

In  order  that  success  may  crown  your  professional  labors,  your  pro- 
fessional knowledge  mu.st  be  accurate  and  extensive.  Theory  and  prac- 
tice must  go  hand  in  hand.  You  must  be  at  home  in  your  particular 
calling;  but  your  knowledge  and  labor  should  not,  however,  be  confined 
exclusively  to  it.  Kindred  or  related  pursuits  will  claim  a  share  of  your 
time  and  attention.  You  must  be  continually  reaching  out  to  them  for 
information  and  assistance — out  into  the  world  at  large,  bringing  its 
advancement  and  improvement  to  bear  upon  your  profession.  Knowl- 
edge, help,  and  encouragement  must  be  drawn  from  everything  around, 
to  perfect  you  in  your  chosen  pursuit.  Give  also  a  portion  of  your  time 
and  talents  to  general  pursuits,  to  society,  to  the  calls  of  country  and 
humanity,  to  the  pleadings  of  benevolence,  to  the  demands  of  religion — 
or,  rather,  religion  should  permeate,  control,  direct  the  whole.  Gain  thus 
new  and  high  experiences,  for  ever)-  noble  experience  will  leave  its  eternal 
impress. 

But  whatever  may  be  your  particular  pursuit  in  life,  there  are  certain 
important  responsibilities  resting  upon  you  as  educated  men  and  women 
beyond  the  duties  of  those  who  have  not  enjoyed  equal  privileges  with 
yourselves.  You  are  called  emphatically  as  educated  youth  to  be  the 
conservators  and  promulgators  of  liberty,  learning,  and  religion.  These 
are  the  triple  guards  of  the  individual — the  triple  foundation  of  the  State 
— the  elements  of  civilization.  No  State  is  secure  without  knowledge  and 
religion  to  uphold  its  liberties.  The  church  is  not  safe  without  the 
largest  liberty  of  conscience  and  the  clear  light  of  knowledge  to  guide 
its  activities.  All  that  is  of  moral  and  spiritual  worth  in  civilization  has 
grown  out  of  the  free  and  harmonious  blending  of  these  three  primal 
elements. 

The  scholars  relations  to  these  great  powers  are  most  intimate  and 
important.  To  the  ignorant  these  treasures  of  knowledge  are  closed. 
He  has  not  the  high  vantage  ground  of  the  scholar  from  which  to  labor. 


2  14  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

He  may  be  inspired  by  high  and  holy  motives,  he  may  be  desirous  of 
doing  good,  but  he  has  not  the  ample  field  of  the  scholar  for  labor.  He 
cannot  give  a  definite  mould  and  lasting  power  to  thought.  To  the 
scholar  the  prospect  is  far  different.  The  fields  of  knowledge  are  his. 
The  hope  and  inspirations  of  religion  are  as  freely  offered  to  him  as  to 
the  rest  of  humanity. 

As  scholars  3'ou  are  to  be  the  bodyguard  of  learning.  Education 
depends  upon  you  for  support  and  progress.  Thinking,  manufacturing 
thought  is  to  be  one  of  your  leading  objects  in  life.  Thought,  deep, 
comprehensive,  enduring  thought,  is  to  be  wrought  out  by  you.  The 
world  brings  materials  to  you  to  be  wrought  into  thought.  You  are  to 
take  these  materials  and  apply  the  test  for  truth,  and  if  it  stands  the  trial, 
the  evolved  thought  is  again  passed  over  to  the  world,  to  be  inwrought 
into  all  the  relations  of  society.  No  individual  is  fully  prepared  to  give 
definite  mould  and  shape  to  thought  for  the  future,  save,  perhaps,  in  the 
region  of  fancy  and  fiction,  until  he  has  faithfully  studied  the  great,  the 
leading  thoughts  of  the  past  on  the  same  subject.  You  are,  however,  to 
make  all  past  knowledge  the  basis,  not  the  limit,  of  research  and  progress. 
It  is  your  duty  to  revise  the  thoughts  of  the  past,  adapting  them  to  the 
present,  and  adding  such  new  ones  as  Providence  and  man  have  evolved. 
It  is  one  of  your  duties  also  to  prepare  thoughts  for  the  future.  It  is 
not  essential  that  these  thoughts  be  written  or  spoken.  The}^  are  often 
better  acted,  revealed  to  the  world  through  great  deeds.  Deeds  fit  for 
history  are  nobler  than  the  writing.  Yes,  it  is  the  high,  noble,  earnest 
endeavor  that  is  greatly  needed. 

Be  not  grumblers  or  croakers,  whining  about  the  hardness  of  your 
lot,  or  the  injustice  of  man,  complaining  that  hatred,  strategies,  treasons, 
machinations,  hollowness,  treacheries,  and  all  "ruinous  discords,"  are 
howling  around  you  and  hissing  you  on  to  the  grave;  but  "put  a  cheerful 
courage  on,"  with  a  "heart  ready  for  any  fate."  Be  not  drones  in  the 
busy  hive  of  humanity. 

You  are  called  upon  by  every  consideration  to  labor  with  such  pur- 
poses and  motives.  Voices  call  to  you  from  the  lowly  graves  of  the 
fathers  of  this  republic,  imploring  you  as  their  children  to  preserve  those 
institutions  for  the  founding  of  which  they  labored  and  suffered.  The 
blood  of  liberty's  martyrs  cries  to  you  from  many  a  battle  field,  beseech- 
ing you  not  to  prove  recreant  to  the  cause  for  which  they  fought,  bled, 
and  died.  You  are  called  upon  by  the  pa.st,  present,  and  future — by  all 
the  poor  and  oppressed — by  all  those  struggling  after  light  and  liberty — 
to  lend  a  helping  hand  in  delivering  this  land  from  intemperance,  oppres- 


SERMONS.  215 

sion,  and  all  error  and  sin — in  scattering  the  fog  and  mist  hanging  over 
the  minds  of  men — in  raising  bleeding  virtue  from  the  dust  and  enthron- 
ing her  in  the  hearts  of  men — in  agitating  the  mighty  ocean  of  mind, 
which,  by  its  convulsions,  may  be  purified  from  the  dark  streams  of  vice 
which  have  so  long  flowed  into  it.  And  when  you  drop  from  time  into 
eternity,  may  your  fall  start  encircling,  expanding  waves,  the  impress  of 
which  the  remotest  shores  of  time  shall  gladly  receive. 

You  are  to  live  and  act  with  high  resolves  and  for  noble  purposes, 
regardless  of  opposition  or  discouraging  prospects,  resting  in  the   full 

assurance  that — 

"Truth  crushed  to  earth  shall  rise  again; 
The  eternal  years  of  God  are  here." 

Do  nothing  without  high  motives  and  a  clear  conscience.  Spare  not  • 
your  lives  for  yourselves,  but  give  your  lives  and  services  freely  for  the 
good  of  others.  Be  aids  to  the  defenseless,  supporters  to  the  lowly, 
comforters  to  the  sorrowing,  liberators  to  the  oppressed.  Live  guileless 
before  God  and  man.  Be  loyal  to  your  country,  bold  for  the  right,  true 
to  duty.  Determine  deliberately,  resolutely,  solemnly,  and  by  divine 
assistance,  to  make  the  very  best  of  your  time  and  talents. 

Remember  that  in  doing  this  you  are  achieving  for  yourselves,  as 
well  as  doing  good  to  others.  You  are  building  up  for  yourselves  char- 
acters glorious  and  lasting — educating  yourselves  for  eternity.  Educa- 
tion is  the  healthful  growth,  the  harmonious  perfecting,  of  the  whole 
being.  Character  is  the  subjective  result,  the  embodiment  of  all  the 
activities  and  habitudes  of  our  being — the  fruit  of  a  lifelong  education 
in  the  great  school  of  the  world.  It  is  the  great  business  of  life,  as  it 
terminates  on  one's  self,  to  form  character.  Character  is  made  out  of, 
is,  the  fruitage  of  life.  All  events,  thoughts,  sights,  sounds,  pains,  pleas- 
ures, toils,  are  taken  into  the'  laboratory  of  our  spiritual  being  and  con- 
verted into  character.  You  are  thus  to  weave  for  yourselves,  out  of  the 
warp  and  woof  of  life  and  labor,  a  robe  which  shall  clothe  your  spirits 
forever.  Yes,  something  more  than  a  garment;  it  is  a  kind  of  spiritual 
body,  furnished  by  the  school  of  life,  with  spiritual  nutriment  and  blood, 
by  which,  if  derived  from  the  gross  feedings  of  sin,  the  whole  spiritual 
being  will  become  polluted  and  leprous.  If  from  heavenly  manna  and 
the  wells  of  salvation,  it  will  be  pure  and  lifesome.  Let  the  lines  which 
you  are  writing  upon  the  unwritten  pages  of  your  spirits  by  the  pen  of 
life  be  such  as  you  will  not  blush  to  read  through  the  endless  ages  of 
eternity.  • 

Happy  indeed  are  you  if,  with  all  your  preparatory  labors,  you  have 
learned  heavenly  wisdom    as  well   as  earthly  knowledge;    if  you  have 


2l6  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

secured  a  hold  on  heaven  by  the  golden  chain  of  faith;  if  you  have  deter- 
mined to  do  with  your  might  whatever  you  find  to  do;  if  you  have  awak- 
ened the  inward  power  that  looks  confidently  onward  and  upward  to 
perfection,  glory,  and  immortality.  If  so.  you  will  grasp  each  golden 
moment  as  it  flies,  and  exchange  it  for  its  equivalent  in  good  done, 
influence  exerted,  character  established.  You  will  make  winds,  waves, 
storms  and  sunshine,  sickness  and  health,  joy  and  sorrow,  adversity  and 
prosperity,  friends  and  foes,  labor  and  leisure,  everything,  produce  the 
"fruits  of  the  Spirit, — love,  joy,  peace,  long-suffering,  gentleness,  good- 
ness, faith,  meekness,  temperance."  Let  industry,  punctuality,  and  per- 
severance be  manifested  in  all  of  your  undertakings.  Let  religion  speak 
forth  in  every  action.  Develop  the  self-searching  power  of  the  soul. 
Keep  awake  the  self-forming  power.  Restrain  the  undue  development 
of  the  passions.  Cherish  intercourse  and  communion  with  the  wise  and 
good  of  all  ages  in  their  richest  and  choicest  thoughts.  Let  the  Bible 
be  your  especial  and  constant  light,  guide,  and  companion.  It  matters 
not  so  much  about  the  lowliness  of  your  lot  as  the  spirit  with  which  you 
live  and  work  in  that  sphere.  The  lowlier  the  lot  the  brighter  may 
appear  the  day-star  of  perfection.  However  humble  your  sphere  or 
calling,  however  limited  your  influence,  whatex^er  may  be  your  career, 
all  along  your  pathway  you  will  be  laboring  and  waiting  for  the  unfold- 
ings  of  eternity  to  reveal  the  full  fruits  of  your  labors. 

May  you  now  go  forth  from  these  halls  to  your  respective  fields  of 
labor  receiving  the  mantles  of  the  great  and  good,  as  they  ascend,  one 
by  one,  to  their  rewards  on  high,  and  so  acquitting  yourselves  of  }-our 
several  life  tasks  that  when  we  all  shall  meet  again  at  that  great  and  last 
examination  day,  the  judgment,  we,  one  and  all,  shall  be  found  there 
with  diplomas  whereon  shall  be  written,  in  lines  of  living  light:  "Well 
done,  good  and  faithful  pupils.  Ye  have  been  faithful  in  your  earthl}- 
and  preparatory  school,  enter  ye  into  your  heavenly  and  eternal  home 
school." 

That  such  may  be  your  career  and  final  destiny  is  the  sincere  and 
earnest  prayer  of  your  teachers  as  they  bid  you  a  sorrowful  farewell. 


SERMONS.  217 


DEATH    OF   THE    PRESIDENT. 

[A  sermon  preached  in  the  First  Seventh-day  Baptist  Church  at  Alfred,  N.  Y., 
April  22,  1865.] 
"And  a  certain  one  of  them,  Caiaphas,  being  high  priest  that  year, 
said  to  them:  Ye  know  nothing;  nor  do  ye  consider,  that  it  is  expedient 
^or  us,  that  one  man  die  for  the  people,  and  that  the  whole  nation  perish 
not.  And  this  he  spake  not  of  himself;  but  being  high  priest  that  year, 
he  prophesied  that  Jesus  should  die  for  the  nation;  and  not  for  the 
nation  only,  but  that  also  he  should  gather  into  one  the  children  of  God 
that  were  scattered  abroad."     John  i  i :  49-5  2  (Bible  Union  Version). 

Caiaphas,  like  many  another  prophet,  spoke  language  with  a  larger 
and  more  pervasive  import  than  he  knew.  John,  as  is  agreed  by  leading 
biblical  scholars,  takes  up  the  high  priest's  words,  modifies  them,  and 
unfolds  this  larger  and  higher  meaning.  It  seemed  next  to  impossible 
for  the  Jews,  and  very  difficult  for  his  immediate  disciples,  to  compre- 
hend that  the  Messiah  of  that  nation  was  to  be  the  world-Christ,  and  that 
this  Christ  could  be  Saviour  only  through  sacrifice,  death.  Humanity 
could  have  no  spiritual  redemption  save  through  the  divine  coming 
down  and  uniting  with  the  human.  This  divine-human  must  needs  take 
on  all  the  limitations  and  liabilities  of  the  human,  being  subjected  to 
temptation,  want,  and  suffering.  Only  thus  could  the  human  be  lifted 
up,  and  made  to  live  again;  only  thus  could  a  way  be  opened  for  human- 
ity to  return  to  its  allegiance  to  the  divine  and  the  prerogatives  of  its 
original  sonship. 

I.  A^^;*  Salvation  without  Suffering— No  Atonement  zvithont  Blood. — 
The  law  of  the  divine  beneficence  is  the  law  of  all  human  benevolence. 
It  is  universal  and  absolute.  All  love  must,  from  its  very  nature,  when 
flowing  out  toward  the  weak,  the  ignorant,  the  sinful,  become  a  sacrifice. 
There  is  not,  nor  can  there  be,  salvation  without  suffering,  atonement 
without  the  shedding  of  blood,  whether  this  salvation  be  spiritual  salva- 
tion, or  whether  it  be  national,  social,  or  physical  salvation.  Jesus 
became  thus,  in  his  life  of  love  and  sacrificial  death,  the  great  ensample 
and  archetype  of  all  human  lives  of  love  and  labors  of  good  will.  All 
benefactors,  all  leaders,  all  elevators  of  humanity,  must  be  patterned 
after  the  divine  prototype.  Humanity  has  never  taken  a  step  forward 
but  that  step  has  dripped  with  blood.  No  truth  affecting  human  char- 
acter or  human  destiny  has  ever  been  reduced  from  the  abstract  to  the 
concrete  without  being  baptized  in  blood.  Every  principle,  coming  as 
an  evanc^el  from  God  to  man,  has  been  received  with  mocks  and  scourges. 


2l8  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

The  divinest  lives  have  ever  been  crowned  with  thorns — their  brows  ever 
damp  with  their  own  blood.  Socrates  and  the  poisoned  cup,  Stephen 
and  stones,  Paul  and  bonds  and  imprisonments,  James  and  the  block, 
Peter  and  the  cross,  with  the  long  and  illustrious  line  of  witnesses,  con- 
fessors, martyrs,  are  not  only  all  typed  in  Calvary,  but  are  likewise 
themselves  types  of  all  consecrations  of  philanthropy,  all  the  devote- 
ments  of  patriotism,  all  the  fidelities  of  friendship. 

Liberty,  civil  and  religious,  is  one  of  the  most  potent  aspirations  of 
humanity,  one  of  the  ever-enduring  forces  of  the  human  soul.  The  Roman 
power  was  startled  into  insecurity  by  a  few  humble,  unpretending  Chris- 
tian men,  standing  up  here  and  there  in  the  empire,  with  a  conscience, 
affirming  that  the  State  was  made  for  man,  not  man  for  the  State,  and, 
above  and  beyond  all,  believing  in  a  spiritual  God,  whose  idol  could  not 
be  set  up  in  the  Parthenon  with  those  of  the  national  gods,  but  who 
must  be  worshiped  in  spirit  and  in  truth,  according  to  the  behests  of  his 
own  Spirit,  whose  presence  and  power  his  worshipers  ever  bear  about 
with  them.  This  allegiance  to  a  higher  law,  this  highest  and  most  sacred 
right  of  man  to  worship  God  according  to  the  behests  of  one's  own  con- 
science, has  cost  the  Christian  church,  it  is  estimated,  three  hundred 
million  lives,  and  the  principle  is  not  yet  fully  established.  Civil  liberty, 
the  child  of  religious  liberty,  like  its  illustrious  sire,  has  a  gory  history. 
Like  all  other  noble  sentiments,  in  embodying  itself  in  human' institu- 
tions, it  must  pass  through  a  Red  Sea  of  blood,  and  wander  long  in  the 
desert  fast  by  Horeb  and  Sinai,  as  preparations  for  its  conquests  and 
possession  of  the  thrones  of  the  world.  The  cry  of  the  people  under  the 
burdens  of  caste  and  oppression  has  come  down  through  the  ages  like 
the  perpetual  wail  of  the. east  wind.  Liberty  came  to  these  western 
shores  amid  tears  and  death.  It  was  organized  into  institutions  with  toil 
and  blood.  At  length,  in  these  last  years,  the  bloodiest  sacrifice  of  all 
times  has  been  laid,  by  the  greatest  and  foremost  republic  the  world  has 
known,  upon  the  altar  of  freedom  and  free  institutions,  and  at  last,  cul- 
minating and  climaxing  all,  each  humblest  member  of  the  republic  has 
been  offered  a  sacrifice  in  and  through  the  representative  and  official 
head,  the  nation's  President,  Abraham  Lincoln. 

II.  Character  of  the  Offering. — As  in  the  divine-human  offering  for 
sin  we  instinctively  turn  away  from  the  betrayers  and  crucifiers  to  the 
Betrayed  and  Crucified,  and  the  blessed  forces  springing  from  the  sacri- 
fice, so  now  let  us  turn  with  deep  detestation  and  horror  from  that  sum 
of  all  wrongs,  slavery,  which  has  for  its  last  and  ripest  fruitage  "the  deep 
damnation"  of  this  high  "taking  off" — let  us  turn  rather  to  the  consid- 


SERMONS.  219 

eration  of  the    positive  and    noble  theme  of  the  offering,  and  the  far- 
reaching  forces  flowing  therefrom. 

I.  It  seems  to  be  God's  plan,  when  he  desires  to  send  a  great  bene- 
factor to  the  world,  to  pass  by  all  who  have  been  volatilized  by  the  frip- 
peries of  a  fashionable  etiquette,  where  the  great  end  of  life  is  in  appear- 
ances,— seeming  rather  than  being, — by  all  who,  through  worldly  pros- 
perity, have  been  like  certain  coralline  animals,  converted  into  stone  as 
they  grow.  He  passed  by  all  such  up,  up  to  the  common  people,  who 
are  comparatively  unaddled  by  the  fooleries  of  fashion,  who  are  not  ener- 
vated by  luxury,  or  hardened  by  worldly  successes,  up  to  the  "plain 
people,"  whose  instincts  and  spontaneities  are  much  more  in  harmony 
with  the  divine,  and  the  windows  of  whose  souls  open  more  directly 
heavenward — from  such  God  is  wont  to  choose  his  especial  evangels 
to  humanity.  Jesus  had  a  manger  for  his  cradle,  prototype  of  the 
origin  of  those  who  come  to  greatly  bless  humanity.  Elisha,  the  plow- 
man, with  the  prophetic  mantle  flung  upon  his  shoulders  by  Elijah,  as 
he  passed  by;  Amos,  from  among  the  herdmen  of  Tekoa;  the  Galilean 
fishermen,  are  the  true  types  of  prophets  and  apostles,  and  of  all  such  as 
have  passed  to  the  spiritual  thrones  of  the  world.  True,  Moses,  the 
Hebrew  deliverer  and  lawgiver,  was  learned  in  all  the  wisdom  of  the 
Egyptians,  but  he,  the  fiery  and  blood-shedding  heir  apparent  to  the 
throne  of  Egypt,  must  be  sent  to  take  care  of  sheep  forty  years  up  in  the 
mountains,  the  divinest  regions  of  the  earth,  and  where  all  highest 
inspirations  are  born  and  nurtured.  Here  by  the  base  of  Horeb  his  spir- 
itual vision  was  clarified  and  illumed,  his  soul  toned  to  sweetest  humility 
and  meekness — full  of  the  largest  sympathy  and  gentleness — and 
impressed  with  the  solemn  grandeur  of  his  mission;  then  he  descends  to 
deliver  Israel,  not  with  crown  and  sword,  but  as  a  simple  shepherd,  with 
his  shepherd's  staff  for  his  scepter.  When  the  time  had  come  for  Prot- 
estantism, its  inauguration  was  taken  from  the  mines,  or,  as  Luther  him- 
.self  states  it:  "I  am  a  peasant's  son;  my  father,  my  grandfather,  and  my 
forefathers,  were  all  genuine  peasants.  My  parents  were  right  poor. 
My  father  was  a  poor  miner,  an  ore  digger,  and  my  mother  carried  her 
wood  on  her  shoulders;  and  after  this  sort  they  supported  us,  their  chil- 
dren." The  glorious  day  of  modern  missions  was  heralded  in  by  a  shoe- 
maker, or,  as  explained  by  himself  when  some  high  official  asked  another 
if  "Gary  had  not  been  a  shoemaker?"  "No,  sir,"  Gary  answered,  "only 
a  cobbler."  So,  when  God  was  about  to  inaugurate  the  same  missionary 
scheme  in  this  country,  he  passed  by  all  ministering  in  co.stly  churches, 
with   their  "long-drawn  aisles  and  fretted  vaults,"  up  to  the  three  young 


2  20  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

men  praying;  by  a  haystack,  and  took  them  for  his  heralds.  So,  hke- 
wise,  the  great  and  beneficent  scheme  of  Sunday  schools  found  its  fore- 
runner in  another  shoemaker,  who,  as  the  historian  quaintly  remarks, 
"while  he  furnished  soles  for  the  parents,  put  souls  into  their  children." 
As  in  the  missions  of  the  gospel,  so  in  the  missions  of  liberty.  God 
chose  the  founders  of  the  republic,  as  to  its  northern  portion,  from  the 
plain  peasantry  of  England,  while  the  southern  portion  was  based  upon 
cavaliers,  aristocrats  gone  to  seed,  adventurers,  fortune  hunters  The 
incompatible  elements  and  forces  ha\-e  struggled  till  they  have  come  to 
blood.  In  this  bloody  struggle  is  a  most  significant  fact — who  has  not 
noted  it? — that  the  most  honored  and  evidently  heaven-appointed  lead- 
ers of  the  common  people,  in  their  ox'erthrow  of  this  aristocratic  rebel- 
lion, have  been  a  rail  splitter,  a  tanner,  and  a  tailor,  as  if  the  common- 
est and  humblest  industries  had  been  anointed  of  God  to  become  the 
standard  bearers  of  liberty  and  equality,  and  through  battle  and  smoke 
and  blood  to  unfurl  their  ensigns  before  the  eyes  of  all  peoples,  on  the 
topmost  heights  of  human  progress  and  human  destiny.  The  foremost 
one  of  these  has  fallen,  just  as  he  was  gaining  the  heights;  but  the  sacred 
ensign  was  caught  up  by  one  next  him,  ere  it  touched  the  ground,  and 
he,  a  Joshua  following  a  Moses,  shall  lead  the  people  across  Jordan  dry 
shod,  and  safely  establish  them  in  Canaan.  Yes,  it  is  full  of  deepest 
significance  that  the  great  martyr  emancipator  should  be  chosen  from 
the  high  plane  of  the  common  people. 

2.  As  a  natural  and  legitimate  outgrowth  of  his  origin,  the  great 
national  offering  was  characterized,  like  most  great  benefactors  of  human- 
ity, by  his  plain,  simple,  straightforward,  manly  honesty.  Simple  as 
truth  itself,  no  pretentious  form  and  ceremony  in  others  could  seduce 
him  to  act  a  hollow  and  unmeaning  part.  Utterly  unassuming,  all  shows 
passed  him  as  the  idle  wind.  He  appeared  and  acted  the  pure,  gentle, 
kind-hearted,  unostentatious  man  just  as  he  was.  I  deem  it  one  of  the 
peculiar  privileges  of  my  life  that  1  had  the  honor  of  taking  by  the  hand 
the  two  great  martyrs  of  liberty,  John  Brown  and  Abraham  Lincoln. 
Both  had  the  same  honest,  hearty,  manly  grip  and  shake,  but  the  eye, 
how  different !  One  had  the  eye  of  an  eagle — the  other  of  a  lamb.  No 
one  can  enter  the  presence  of  manly  simplicity  without  feeling  himself 
ennobled  by  that  presence.  It  was  to  this  high,  simple  manliness  that 
the  instincts  of  the  people  spontaneously  responded,  in  which  the)-  so 
implicitly  trusted. 

3.  A  correlative  of  this  native  simplicity  was  his  broad,  roundabout 
conmion   sense.      He  was  the  embodied  common    consciousness   of  the 


SERMONS.  22  1 

Anicrican  people.      His  was  evidently  not  one  of  those  far-visioned  minds 
that  catch  the  first  illuminings  of  new  truths  on  the  mountain  tops  of 
human  destiny,  and  flash  them  down  on  the  uplooking  people,  or  one  of 
those  delicately  attuned  spirits  that  vibrate  to  the  slightest  touch  of  the 
eternal  and  universal  harmonies  of  law,  and  translate  those  harmonies  into 
language  for  the  listening  multitudes.     He  stood   rather  with  the  multi- 
tudes and  interpreted  for  them  their  understanding  of  the  truths  and  laws 
that  had  been  announced  to  them,  and  utilized  the  abstract  into  living, 
active  forces.     Hence  it  was  that  he  could  state  a  principle  so  as  to  be 
apprehended  by  the  common  consciousness  of  the  masses,  apprehended  so 
clearly  and  forcibly  that  they  were  ready  to  act  upon  it.     He  probably 
could  do  this  more  clearly  and  forcibly  than  any  other  living  American, 
however  highly  educated  he  might  be.     His  letters  and  speeches  have 
already  become  models  after  which  the  young   are    taught    to  pattern 
themselves.      Hence  it  was,  also,  that  he  never  was  ahead  of,  or  behind, 
the  convictions  of  the  masses.     Probably  all  of  the  great  acts    of   his 
administration  were  performed  just  at  the  time  when  the  majority  of  the 
American  people  were  clearly  and    decidedly  with    him.      If  they  had 
been  performed  sooner,  the  majority  would  not  have  supported  him;  if 
performed  later,  the  masses  would  have  outstripped  him.     His  acts  were 
thus  but  the  crystallized  convictions  of  those  he  acted  for.     Thus  it  was 
his  administration  ever  rested  securely  upon  the  shoulders  of  majorities. 
Many,  very  many  of  the  more  radical,  progressive  Republicans  voted  for 
him  at  his  first  election,  feeling  that  he  was  too  conservative,  was  want- 
ing in  the  manifold  experiences  of  a  long-practiced  statesman.     But  there 
evidently  was  a  Providence  in  it.     These  very  facts  placing  him,  as  they 
did,  but  just  ahead  of  the  great  masses,  enabled  him  to  control  and  lead 
them  up  to  higher  planes  of  duty  much  more  readily  than  could  have 
been  done  by  a  more  radical  and  experienced  man,  against  whom  the 
prejudices  of  the  people  would  have  been  too  strongly  set  to  have  been 
easily  swayed  to  the  grave  responsibilities  of  these  solemn  years,  through 
which  the  nation  has  been  passing.     He  led  or  was  led,  guided  or  was 
guided,  confessing  that  events  controlled  him— which,  to  the  weak   or 
frivolous,  is  waiting  for  and  drifting  with  the  tide  of  things;  to  the  pru- 
dent, is  watchfulness  of  opportunities;  to  the  religious,  is  the  guidance 
of  Providence  and  the  harmonizing  of  life  to  the  prayer,  "Thy  will   be 
done." 

Tennyson's  lines  for  another  apply  with  brimming  fullness  now:— 


222  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

' '  Mourn  for  the  man  of  amplest  influence, 
Yet  clearest  of  ambitious  crime, 
Our  greatest,  yet  with  least  pretense, 
Rich  in  saving,  common  sense. 
And  as  the  greatest  only  are 
In  his  simplicity  sublime, 
Such  was  he  whom  we  deplore." 

4.  Abraham  Lincoln,  like  most  great  historic  characters,  seemed  to 
feel  upon  himself  the  behests  of  a  definite  and  great  mission,  in  which 
he  was  but  an  humble,  an  unworthy  instrument. 

"Souls  destined  to  o'erleap  the  vulgar  lot 
And  mould  the  world  into  the  scheme  of  God, 
Have  a  foreconsciousness  of  their  high  doom." 

The  perpetuity  of  the  Union,  the  liberties  of  the  people,  not  only  of 
this  nation,  but  of  the  world,  not  onlj/  now,  but  "for  all  future  time;" 
"the  lifting  of  artificial  weights  from  all  shonlders;"  to  demonstrate  that 
"  no  successful  appeal  can  be  made  from  ballots  to  bullets;"  to  "teach 
men  that  what  they  cannot  take  by  an  election,  neither  can  they  take  by 
a  war,"  were  questions  of  which  he  seemed  to  have  a  presentiment,  with 
which  he  had  a  living  and  determinative  connection.  Not  only  this,  but 
the  fiery  trials  through  which  they  were  passing  would  light  all  con- 
nected with  them  "down  in  honor  or  dishonor  to  the  latest  generation." 
His  address  to  his  friends  and,  neighbors  at  Springfield,  as  he  started  for 
his  work,  has  a  spirit  kindred  to  that  of  the  prophets,  as  manifested  in 
the  words  read  for  our  morning  lesson,  words  uttered  by  him  as  he  was 
about  to  enter  his  mission.     Listen  to  it: — 

"My  Friends:  No  one  not  in  my  position  can  appreciate  the  sadness 
I  feel  at  this  parting.  To  this  people  I  owe  all  that  I  am.  Here  I  have 
lived  more  than  a  quarter  of  a  century;  here  my  children  were  born; 
and  here  one  of  them  lies  buried.  I  know  not  how  soon  I  shall  see  you 
again.  A  duty  devolves  upon  me  which  is,  perhaps,  greater  than  that 
which  has  devolved  upon  any  other  man  since  the  days  of  Washington 
He  never  would  have  succeeded  except  for  the  aid  of  Divine  Providence, 
upon  which  he  at  all  times  relied.  I  feel  that  I  cannot  succeed  without 
the  same  divine  aid  which  sustained  him,  and  on  the  same  Almight)' 
Being  I  place  my  reliance  for  support;  and  I  hope  that  you,  my  friends, 
will  all  pray  that  I  may  receive  that  divine  assistance,  without  which  I 
cannot  succeed,  but  with  which  success  is  certain.  Again  I  bid  you  all 
an  affectionate  fiirewell." 

5.  Consecration. — All  beneficently  great  lives  of  history  have  conse- 
crated lives,  lives  of  devotement  to  some  definite  and  all-absorbing  work. 


SERMONS.  223 

They  have  not  only  felt  the  behests,  the  inspiration,  of  a  call,  but  have 
responded  to  that  call  with  a  free  and  full  giving  up  of  self,  laying  all 
upon  the  altar  of  that  work.  This  faith  in  a  mission,  and  consecration 
to  that  mission,  is  the  power  that  elevates  the  world.  Knowledge  is 
power,  but  the  aspirations  enkindled  by  the  inspirations  of  faith  in  a 
vocation  is  a  far  greater  power.  That  our  martyr  President  was  borne 
on  by  the  power  of  such  a  consecration  is  taught  not  only  by  his  life,  but 
likewise  by  his  works.      Listen  to  his  speech  at  Gettysburg: — 

"  Fourscore  and  seven  years  ago  our  fathers  brought  forth  upon  this 
continent  a  new  nation,  conceived  in  liberty,  and  dedicated  to  the  propo- 
sition that  all  men  are  created  equgl.  Now  we  are  engaged  in  a  great 
civil  war,  testing  whether  that  nation,  or  any  nation  so  conceived  and 
so  dedicated,  can  long  endure.  We  are  met  on  a  great  battle  field  of  that 
war.  We  have  come  to  dedicate  a  portion  of  that  field  as  a  final  resting 
place  for  those  who  here  gave  their  lives  that  that  nation  might  live.  It 
is  altogether  fitting  and  proper  that  we  should  do  this.  But  in  a  larger 
sense  we  cannot  dedicate,  we  cannot  consecrate,  we  cannot  hallow  this 
ground.  The  brave  men.  living  and  dead,  who  struggled  here  have  con- 
-secrated  it  far  above  our  power  to  add  or  detract.  The  world  will  little 
note,  nor  long  remember,  what  we  say  here,  but  it  can  never  forget  what 
they  did  here.  It  is  for  us,  the  living,  rather  to  be  dedicated  here  to  the 
unfinished  work  which  they  who  fought  here  have  thus  far  so  nobly 
advanced.  It  is  rather  for  us  to  be  here  dedicated  to  the  great  task 
remaining  before  us,  that  from  these  honored  dead  we  take  increased 
devotion  to  that  cause  for  which  they  gave  the  last  full  measure  of  devo- 
tion ;  that  we  here  highly  resolve  that  these  dead  shall  not  have  died  in 
vain;  that  this  nation,  under  God,  shall  have  a  new  birth  of  freedom,  and 
that  government  of  the  people,  by  the  people,  and  for  the  people  shall 
not  perish  from  the  earth." 

And  if  report  be  true,  he  there  not  only  reconsecrated  himself  to 
patriotism  and  liberty,  but  he  then  and  there  dedicated  himself  to  God 
and  holiness,  through  Christ,  without  which  all  other  devotion  is  flat 
and  groveling,  and  can  never  raise  one  above  the  murk  and  mists  of  a 
worldly  humanitarianism,  for  no  fountain  can  rise  higher  than  its  source; 
but  with  such  a  dedication  one  becomes  a  medium  and  agent  for  all 
divine  and  heavenward  lifting  powers,  whereby  man  may  be  lifted  to 
higher  and  nobler  destinies. 

6.  "  With  Malice  tozvard  None,  zvith  Charity  for  All.'' — It  was  most 
legitimate  and  befitting  that  the  great  liberator,  like  c?// benefactors,  should 
be  crowned   with  that  crown  of  glory,  charity.      A  simplicity  that  was 


2  24  ^'^^^    ^^^    PRESIDENT    ALLEN, 

nobility,  a  purity  lucent  as  light,  an  honesty  that  was  incorruptibility,  a 
conservatism  that  was  ever  progressive  yet  never  innovative,  a  true  man- 
hood that  overtopped  all  rank  and  outshone  all  display,  were  all  glorified 
by  a  tenderness  tliat  was  womanly,  a  magnanimity  that  could  never  be 
betrayed  into  harshness  or  ungenerousness  of  word  or  deed,  a  forgiv- 
ingness  that  had  its  spring  in  that  great  model  world  prayer,  "  Father, 
forgive  them,  for  they  know  not  what  they  do."  In  this  spirit  was  his 
last  official  word  to  the  world.  How  remarkable!  To  the  frivolous  and 
shallow,  a  theme  for  jesting  and  ridicule;  to  the  thoughtful  and  religious, 
a  theme  for  meditation  and  reverent  thankfulness.  The  following,  from 
that  inaugural,  reads  more  like  a  chapter  from  some  clear-visioned, 
solemn-voiced  Hebrew  prophet  of  old  time  than  like  paragraphs  from 
modern  political  speeches  or  State  papers : — 

"Both  read  the  same  Bible  and  pray  to  the  same  God,  and  each 
invokes  his  aid  against  the  other.  It  may  seem  strange  that  any  man 
should  dare  to  ask  a  just  God's  assistance  in  wringing  his  bread  from  the 
sweat  of  other  men's  faces;  but  let  us  judge  not,  that  we  be  not  judged. 
The  prayers  of  both  could  not  be  answered.  That  of  neither  has  been 
answered  fully.  The  Almighty  has  his  own  purposes.  'Woe  unto  the 
world  because  of  offenses,  for  it  mu.st  needs  be  that  offenses  come;  but 
woe  to  that  man  by  whom  the  offense  cometh.'  If  we  shall  suppose  that 
American  slavery  is  one  of  these  offenses,  which  in  the  providence  of 
God  must  needs  come,  but  which,  having  continued  through  his  ap- 
pointed time,  he  now  wills  to  remove,  and  that  he  gives  to  both  North 
and  South  this  terrible  war  as  the  woe  due  to  those  by  whom  the  offense 
came,  shall  we  discern  therein  any  departure  from  those  divine  attributes 
which  the  believers  in  a  living  God  always  ascribe  to  him  ?  Fondly  do 
we  hope,  fervently  do  we  pray,  that  this  mighty  scourge  of  war  may  soon 
pass  away.  Yet,  if  God  wills  that  it  continue  until  all  the  wealth  piled 
by  the  bondman's  two  hundred  and  fifty  years  of  unrequited  toil  shall  be 
sunk,  and  until  every  drop  of  blood  drawn  with  the  lash  shall  be  paid 
with  another  drawn  with  the  sword,  as  was  said  three  thousand  years 
ago,  so  still  it  must  be  said,  'The  judgments  of  the  Lord  are  true  and 
righteous  altogether.' 

"With  malice  toward  none,  with  charity  for  all,  with  firmness  in  the 
right,  as  God  gives  us  to  see  the  right,  let  us  strive  on  to  finish  the  work 
we  are  in,  to  bind  up  the  nation's  wounds,  to  care  for  him  who  shall  have 
borne  the  battle,  and  for  his  widow  and  his  orphans,  to  do  all  which  may 
achieve  and  cherish  a  just  and  lasting  peace  among  ourselves  and  with 
all  nations." 


SERMONS.  225 

Such  are  some  of  the  most  prominent  points  in  the  character  of  the 
remarkable  man  now  crowned  with  martyrdom  for  freedom.  His  whole 
character,  how  touchingly  .symbolized  in  his  visit  to  Richmond,  the  last 
journey  of  his  life,  when,  in  the  glitter  of  victory,  amid  the  shouts  of  the 
nation,  he  entered  the  city,  not  clad  in  the  robes  of  triumph,  after  the 
manner  of  conquerors,  but  "that  tall,  awkward  form,  clad  in  plain  citizen's 
dress,  that  homely,  kindly,  fatherly  face,  looking  its  frank  good  will  on 
the  mixed,  strange,  doubtful  population,  his  only  attendant  his  own  little 
son,  clinging  to  his  father's  hand.  Now  all  that  is  earthly  of  him  is  being 
borne  to  the  geographical  center  of  the  republic  for  its  home  and  its 
rest,  along  a  thousand  miles  of  a  procession  sable  with  mourning  and 
sobbing  with  grief  A  nation  follows  with  bowed,  uncovered  head  as 
mourner.  Liberty  is  pallbearer.  Two  oceans  chant  the  requiem.  All 
peoples,  looking  and  listening,  through  tears  catch  up  the  solemn  refrain 
and  repeat  it  round  the  earth. 

III.  Fruitage. — The   dust  of  martyrs  has  ever  been  a  seed  sure  to 
spring  up  and  yield  fruit,  some  thirty,  some  sixty,  some  an  hundred-fold. 
Jesus,  when  teaching  his  disciples  the  necessity  of  his  death,  announced 
the  first  and  controlling  law  of  all  growth :  "  Except  a  corn  of  wheat  fall 
into  the  ground  and  die,  it  abideth  alone;  but  if  it  die,  it  bringeth  forth 
much  fruit."     How  heavily  laden  has  been  the  fruiting  through  these 
eighteen  centuries  of  that  divine  corn  that  fell  into  the  earth  with  his 
death!     The  powers  of  evil  have  ever  labored  under  the  hallucination 
that  great  principles  die  with   their  champions.     Rather  than  this    the 
very  life  power  of  the  champion  at  death  seems  to  be  transmitted  into 
the  principles  for  which  he  dies.     The  Council  of  Constance  thought  by 
burning  Huss  and  Jerome  at  the  stake,  and  scattering  their  ashes  to  the 
winds,  and  ordering  that  the  body  of  Wickliffe  should  be  disinterred  and 
burnt  to  ashes, — by  these  acts  it  thought  to  check  the  spread  of  Bible 
knowledge  among  the  people.     The  primate  of  England  superintended 
the  ceremony  of  burning  the  bones  of  the  reformer,  that  had  rested  more 
than  forty  years  in  the  grave,  and  throwing  their  ashes  into  the  river 
Swift.     The  quaint  old  Fuller  truly  says,  "The  Swift  conveyed  his  ashes 
into  the  Avon,  Avon  into  the  Severn,  Severn  into  the  narrow  seas,  they 
to  the  main  ocean,  and  thus  they  are  the  emblem  of  his  doctrine,  which 
now  is  dispersed  the  world  over."     Virginia  paid  with  the  most  cheerful 
alacrity  half  a  million  of  dollars  to  make  ready  John  Brown's  body  for 
the  burial;    and    though  "John  Brown's    body  hes    mouldering    in    the 
grave,"  still  his  soul — oh,  how  grandly!  "is  marching  on"  through  all 
these  solemn  years.     And  who  of  all  the  South  has  not  seen  it  in  "the 


2  26  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

watchfires  of  a  hundred  circling  camps,"  and  read  its  "fiery  gospel  writ 
in  burnished  rows  of  steel,"  has  not  heard  its  jubilant  choruses  swelling 
through  the  land,  keeping  time  to  the  tramp  of  pale  and  dusky  legions  ? 
The  other  day  a  little  boy  was  seen  kneeling  on  the  pavement  in  Wash- 
ington, and  carefully  wiping  up  spots  of  stain  with  bits  of  paper,  and 
carefully  putting  those  pieces  in  his  pocket.  Being  asked  what  it  meant, 
he  replied  that  it  was  the  blood  of  the  President,  and  very  precious. 
Yes,  how  precious  and  how  fruitful!  Each  ultimatest  globule  shall 
fructify  in  richest  fruitage,  both  for  millions  that  now  live  and  hunger 
and  for  other  millions  yet  unborn. 

Its  immediate  fruitage,  if  we  mistake  not,  is  this:  Mercy  is  slain, 
justice  made  alive.  A  Moses,  full  of  all  gentleness  and  forgiveness,  has 
fallen;  a  Joshua,  full  of  justice,  leads  on.  What  Sumter  was  for  the 
nation's  patriotism  and  the  preservation  of  the  Union,  such  is  the  mar- 
tyrdom of  the  President  for  national  justice  and  the  uplifting  of  the  poor 
degraded  white  man  of  the  South,  and  the  enfranchisement  of  the  enslaved 
black  man.  It  was  my  lot  to  be  one  of  that  multitude,  "shattered  and 
sundered,"  struggling  back  into  Washington  on  the  morning  after  the 
first  battle  of  Bull  Run.  Through  that  long,  heart-sickening  retreat  the 
sad,  oft-repeated  question  was :  "  Wherefore  this  ?  What  means  this  ? 
Where  is  the  Providence  in  this?"  No  answer  came  till  we  stood  on 
the  heights  overlooking  the  capitol,  and  the  city  sitting  in  dejection  at 
its  feet,  and  the  dim  clouds  weeping  over  all.  Then,  like  an  arrow  of 
light,  came  the  answer,  "Every  military  defeat  is  a  victory  for  freedom." 
Whatever  may  be  the  intention  of  politicians,  of  people,  or  President,  God 
intends  no  lifting  of  the  scourge  of  war,  but  will  shake  and  shatter  the 
nation  till  the  shackles  fall  from  every  slave.  Thus  now  we  of  the  North, 
in  our  high  Christian  magnanimity,  if  you  please,  and  noble  generosity, 
were  eager  to  throw  aside  our  war  gear  in  the  moment  of  victory,  and 
take  to  our  forgiving  embrace  those  who,  for  the  sake  of  building  a  power 
resting  upon  the  necks  of  an  abject  race  for  its  chief  corner  stone,  had 
rebelled  against  the  authority  of  ballots,  and,  by  attempting  to  make 
allegiance  a  mockery,  sap  the  life  of  the  nation.  We  were  willing  to  for- 
give and  forget  all  this,  and  seemingly  were  about  to  open  up  a  way 
whereby  the  leaders  in  rebellion  might  be  leaders  still,  with  power  and 
privilege  to  plot  and  domineer  hereafter  as  heretofore,  but  God  evidently 
intends  otherwise.  He,  whose  justice  is  as  absolute  as  his  mercy  is 
infinite,  is  laying  upon  us  the  behest  that  we  shall  respect  and  revere 
justice  as  we  love  mercy,  and  that  peace,  permanent  and  beneficent, 
cannot  come  through  the  crowning  of  the  one  and  the  crucifying  of  the 


SERMONS.  227 

Other.  He,  doubtless,  will  instruct  us  that  he  who  appeals  from  the 
ballot  to  the  bullet  can  never  again  have  the  rights  of  the  ballot.  Citi- 
zenship bartered  thus  recklessly  for  a  mess  of  pottage  cannot  be  had 
again  for  the  simple  asking.  Let  us  fervently  pray  that  the  cup  may 
pass  from  us  without  the  further  shedding  of  blood,  even  of  the  leaders 
in  rebellion ;  but  let  us  as  fervently  pray  and  earnestly  labor  that  they 
may  never  have  the  franchises  of  citizenship.  Such  is  the  divine  will,  if 
we  read  His  providences  aright,  concerning  all  the  chiefs  of  rebellion. 

Again,  the  martyrdom  of  the  President  has  blotted  out  differences, 
hushed  bickerings,  united,  cemented  us,  as  never  before.  The  nation 
has  risen  to  its  feet  as  one  man,  and,  with  uncovered  head  and  uplifted 
hand,  solemnly  swears  that  freedom  and  free  institutions  shall  live.  We 
are  a  stronger,  a  more  united  nation  to-day  than  ever  before.  We  stand 
before  the  nations  of  the  earth  consecrated  to  liberty  in  a  higher  and 
more  sacred  sense  than  before.  Every  soldier  that  has  died,  every  wound 
received,  every  drop  of  blood,  every  tear  shed,  every  pang  suffered,  has 
ennobled,  consecrated,  made  more  sacred,  the  republic  and  its  mission, 
and  now  this  last  great  official,  thereby  representative,  sacrifice  has  lifted 
us,  one  and  all,  to  the  plane  of  a  common  consecration.  Henceforward 
the  mission  of  the  republic  becomes  loftier  than  before,  farther  reaching, 
more  pervasive  and  controlling.  This  nation  stands  to-day,  as  never 
before,  in  the  front  of  human  progress,  opening  up  a  way,  gory  with  sac- 
rifice, luminous  with  heroism,  for  all  nations  to  follow.  To  borrow  a 
figure  from  a  recent  English  speaker  before  a  London  audience,  which 
is  said  to  have  roused  that  audience  as  a  tempest  harping  on  a  great 
forest:  "The  American  republic  is  the  Christ  among  nations,  and,  though 
it  is  being  crucified  during  these  four  years,  yet  it  shall  speedily  have  a 
resurrection;  and  when  that  resurrection  comes,  the  veil  of  the  temple  of 
English  aristocracy,  of  European  caste,  shall  be  rent  in  twain."  Yes, 
the  republic  is  an  evangel  among  nations,  and  all  that  have  died  for  it 
have  died,  not  only  for  their  own  nation,  but  all  peoples;  and  that  beau- 
tiful stanza  of  a  new  poem,  with  a  slight  change,  expresses  the  sublime 
doctrine  of  our  theme: — 

"  In  the  beauty  of  the  lilies  Christ  was  born  across  the  sea, 
With  a  glory  in  his  bosom  that  transfigures  you  and  me. 
As  he  died  to  make  men  holy,  so  they  die  to  make  men  free." 

If  the  attainment  is  in  proportion  to  the  sacrifice,  the  harvesting  as 
the  seed  sown,  great  to  the  world  must  be  the  help  and  gain  of  these 
four  years  of  blood,  for  never  was  there  made  a  more  plentiful  sowing, 
or  a  more  costly  sacrifice  laid  on  the  altar  of  Liberty.     Guizot  says, 


228  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

"Providence  takes  a  step  forward,  and  ages  have  rolled  away;"  but  these 
four  years  have  been  those  ages  for  liberty  and  equality.  Providence  is 
visibly  controlling,  guiding,  leading  on.  Now,  as  never  before,  can  all 
peoples  catch  up  the  anthem  of  the  seraphim  in  the  vision  of  the  prophet, 
and  cry  one  unto  another,  "Holy,  holy,  holy  is  the  Lord  of  hosts;  the 
whole  earth  is  full  of  his  glory."  Yes,  the  earth  is  full  of  his  glory,  if 
we  but  have  clarified  vision  to  behold.  Sublimely  does  he  manifest  him- 
self How  solemn  and  grand  it  is  to  live  in  these  times!  How  rich  in 
opportunity!  How  solemn  in  responsibility!  Never  were  the  workers 
for  humanity  and  for  God  placed  on  such  vantage  ground  as  now. 
Then  let  us  gather  to  ourselves  all  of  these  powers  for  good,  and  conse- 
crate them  all  to  the  great  work  unfolding  before  us,  resting  in'  the  divine 
assurance  that  all  sacrifice  for  God  and  humanity  shall  spring  into  imme- 
diate and  abundant  fruitage. 


FAITH 


[Baccalaureate  sermon,  delivered  June  28,  1874.] 
"Faith  working  by  love."     Gal.  5:6. 

As  is  a  man's  philosophy,  so  will  be  his  theology;  as  is  his  theology, 
so  will  be  the  structure  of  his  religion.  It  is  the  anatomy  of  religion, 
but  an  anatomy  dead  till  clothed  upon  by  the  power  of  a  divinely  living 
faith. 

I.  The  mechanical  theory  in  philosophy  has,  down  through  the  Chris- 
tian ages,  largely  given  type  to  many  of  the  doctrines  of  theology. 
According  to  this  theory.  Deity  is  the  great  Mechanician,  the  infinite 
Artificer,  who  has  constructed  this  goodly  mechanism,  the  universe, 
according  to  certain  fixed  laws,  set  the  whole  in  motion, to  run  its  course, 
with  just  enough  of  occasional  or  special  providences  to  keep  it  regulated. 
He  works  from  the  outside  down  upon,  and  into,  the  universe.  This 
theory  of  divine  operations  has  been  carried  into  all  departments  of 
thought,  permeating  our  whole  system  of  knowledge.  It  has  especially 
given  a  hard,  dry,  mechanical  cast  to  dogmatic  theology.  The  dynami- 
cal or  vital  theory,  suggested,  though  imperfectly,  by  Liebnitz,  in  his 
Monadology,  represents  the  genesis  of  the  universe  through  internal 
agency.  Creation  is  not  ex  nihiio,  that  is,  from  both  a  subjective  and  an 
objective  void,  but  from  the  divine  fullness  of  power  objectized  and  local- 


SERMONS.  229 

ized  in  space  as  matter,  substance,  thus  being  the  free  spontaneous  energy 
objectized,  and,  becoming  an  effect  in  time,  furnishes  the  material  for  God 
to  fill  out  his  archetypes  and  thus  render  his  subjective  ideals  overt  reali- 
ties. This  dynamical,  in  its  higher  forms,  becomes  the  vital  theory. 
This  vital  or  organic  doctrine  teaches  that  the  universe  is  but  the  perpet- 
ual and  everywhere  present  unfolding  of  divine  power,  informing,  ener- 
gizing, and  controlling.  All  natural  phenomena  are  the  direct  expression 
of  the  divine  presence  and  will  in  power.  The  laws  of  the  universe  are 
the  uniform  activity  of  the  divine  personal  will,  guided  by  reason,  lighted 
by  ideas,  regulated  and  directed  by  purpose.  All  natural  agencies  are 
modes  of  the  divine  activities.  This  avoids  the  paradox  of  an  active 
universe  and  an  inactive  Deity,  or  of  intense  activity  at  one  time  and 
quiescence  forever  after,  as  demanded  by  the  mechanical  theory,  with  its 
Deity  enthroned  in  the  eternities,  as  a  passive  spectator  of  the  gradual 
running  down  of  the  universe.  Instead  of  a  dead,  hard,  j^ert  mass  of 
matter  choking  up  space,  as  Fichte  expresses  it,  there  rushes  the  eternal 
stream  of  power,  and  life,  and  deed.  The  life  of  the  universe  is  a  per- 
petual generation — life  welling  forth  with  perpetual  efflux.  The  universe 
thus  is  not  an  emanation  rayed  out  from  Deity,  nor  mechanism  by  an 
artificer,  but  an  outgrowth  of  objectized  power,  known  as  force,  with 
laws  which  are  the  uniform  action  of  personal  power.  This  avoids  a 
double  providence — a  general  and  a  special  or  occasional  providence 
becoming  at  once  universal  and  particular,  everywhere  and  at  all  times 
active,  with  the  general  uniformity  of  Deity's  own  unchangeableness, 
and,  at  the  same  time,  having  all  the  limberness  of  life.  It  specializes  all 
providences,  yet  grounding  them  in  general  laws.  Instead  of  dead,  hard 
matter  and  unyielding  mechanisms,  insensate  forces,  unconscious  forms, 
there  is  everywhere  the  living  presence,  the  conscious  spirit,  the  per- 
vading God. 

2.  Hti?nanitr,  the  Child  of  God. — -The  fatherhood  of  God,  and  the 
childship  of  spirits,  is  a  doctrine  lying  at  the  foundation  of  human  exist- 
ence, determining  its  nature  and  its  mode  of  redemption.  This  divine 
childship  of  souls  constitutes  a  real  and  living  relation  and  communion 
with  God,  "the  Father  of  Spirits."  The  image  and  likeness  of  man  to 
God  rests  in  this  kinship,  in  this  spiritual  sonship.  As  the  image  of  the 
earthly  parent  reproduced  in  his  child  is  not  so  much  in  likeness  of  form 
and  feature  as  of  the  inner  and  more  essential  nature,  of  which  the  out- 
ward is  but  a  faint  expression,  so  the  image  of  God  in  man  is  not  in 
physical  conformation,  but  in  life  and  power,  in  essence  and  attributes. 
God  is  a  spirit.     The  essence  of  spirit  is  life,  with  the  attributes  of  thought. 


230  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

sentiment,  will.  This  is  the  essential  of  all  his  children.  When  God 
breathed  into  man  the  breath  of  life,  he  imparted  to  him  the  essential 
principle  of  his  own  nature.  Man,  the  offspring  of  God,  was  created  to 
consciously  live,  move,  and  have  his  being  in  God.  This  offspring  nature 
of  man  declares  it  to  be  the  mission  of  humanity  to  live  out,  in  all  of  its 
personalities,  the  divine  life.  All  spiritual  life  and  activity  spring  from 
the  connection  of  the  divine  with  the  human.  Thus  humanity  is  organ 
for  the  divine.  His  wisdom  is  the  outshining  of  the  divine  wisdom. 
His  growth  in  grace  is  the  unfolding  of  the  divine  life.  His  love  is  the 
overflow  of  the  divine  love  shed  abroad  in  his  nature.  "The  inspiration 
of  the  Almighty  giveth  understanding."  Religion  is  the  divine  life  in 
the  soul.  This  arises  from  the  generic  oneness  of  God  and  humanity. 
This  kinship  gives  connection  and  way  for  all  divine  revelations  to  illumine 
the  spirit,  all  divine  inspirations  to  vivify  and  empower  it.  Humanity 
lost  this  in  sinning.  The  inflowing  of  the  God  life  was  interrupted,  com- 
munion through  the  faith  faculty  obscured,  the  G6d  consciousness 
depressed.  The  animal  gained  the  ascendency.'  Sin  became  the  great 
experimental  reality. 

3.  Conscience. — According  to  the  ultimate  analysis  of  the  term  in  its 
etymological  and  religious  sense,  conscience  is  the  "associate  knowing 
with  God"  faculty.  This  is  the  necessary  consequence  of  the  indwelling 
of  the  divine  in  the  human,  accompanied  by  the  approving  or  disapprov- 
ing impulse.  There  is  a  constant  inner-living  intercourse  of  God  with 
man  through  this  faculty.  This  gives  a  double  result — faith  assurance 
proper,  or  God  consciousness,  and  an  ethical  action,  revealing  and  enforc- 
ing ethical  behests.  This  is  known  as  conscience.  It  is  the  divine 
testifying  itself  to  and  in  the  human,  and  the  response  of  the  soul  to  the 
voice  of  divinity  within.  It  is  the  light  that  lighteth  every  man.  It  is  a 
reflex  moral,  religious  activity  to  the  self-evidencing  of  divine  holiness — 
a  reaction  of  the  God-centered  faculty — revealing  not  only  the  being  of 
God,  but  likewise  his  nature  as  the  perfect  and  holy,  awakening  a  behest 
commanding  holiness.  This  behest  becomes  the  living  law  within  the 
heart,  a  perpetual  witnessing  of  the  divine  holiness.  The  conscience  is 
thus  the  divine  receptivity;  hence  it  is  not  the  expression  of  the  soul 
itself,  but  of  God.  It  is  not  under  the  control  of  man,  but  ever  comes 
to  him  as^a  power  from  above.  The  soul  can  be  so  educated  as  to  make 
its  monitions  more  clear  and  definite,  or  its  voice  can  be  muffled  and  dis- 
torted by  sin  and  false  training,  the  soul  thus  becoming  dead  to  all  the 
higher  inspirations  of  faith,  hope,  charity,  its  light  obscured,  as  fogs  and 
mists  obscure;  but  as  the  essential  of  light  is  not  changed  thereby,  so 


SERMONS.  231 

neither  is  conscience.  It  may  be  obscured  or  distorted,  but  cannot  be 
eradicated,  but  ever  remaining  as  an  excusing  or  an  accusing  power,  with 
the  sense  of  the  divine  still  Hngering  "like  the  smoking  wick  of  an  expir- 
ing candle."  Strictly  speaking,  we  do  not  have  our  consciences,  but  our 
'  consciences  have  us.  They  possess  us,  not  we  them,  like  Socrates'  good 
demon.     It  is  the  holy  of  holies  of  the  soul. 

4.  Conscience  as  Faith  Faculty. — The  faith  organ  of  the  soul  is  con- 
science in  its  Godward  activities,  or  in  its  capacity  of  receptivity  of  the 
divine,  becoming  conscience  proper  in  its  responsive  spontaneities  to  the 
behests  of  the  divine.  As  organ  or  faculty  for  this  vital  connection,  and 
the  medium  for  the  inflow  of  the  eternal  life,  it  is  the  faith  faculty.  It  is 
the  spontaneous  appetency  of  the  soul  for  the  divine,  and  gives  the 
inward  experience  by  contact  with  spiritual,  invisible,  or  supersensible 
realities,  as  the  instincts,  appetites,  and  propensities  are  correlated  to  their 
respective  objects,  and  through  perception  give  the  experience  of  sensi- 
ble things.  It  is  the  power,  not  by  which  we  guess  or  suspect  spiritual 
realities,  but  by  which  we  know  them.  Conscience  as  faith  is  the  God- 
knowing  faculty.  It  is  the  faculty  in  and  through  which  he  reveals  him- 
self experimentally  to  the  soul,  as  the  absolute,  perfect,  and  infinite,  given 
by  movements,  monitions,  and  at  length  as  a  clear  consciousness.  It  is 
the  presentative  power  revealing  God,  as  sense  is  of  the  world.  Its 
unsatisfied  activity  is  a  want,  a  longing,  a  divine  hunger,  an  aspiration 
after  the  infinite.  Augustine's  noted  saying,  "  Thou  hast  made  us  for 
Thyself,  and  we  cannot  rest  till  we  rest  in  Thee,"  gives  the  origin  and  end 
of  faith.  As  the  tree  ever  stands  with  its  myriad  leaf-palms  lifted  sky- 
ward, as  the  flower  ever  looks  with  open  eye  sunward,  so  the  soul  through 
faith,  rising  above,  the  ethical,  stands  looking  and  stretching  Godward  b}' 
impulse,  by  insight,  by  aspiration.  It  is  thus  the  primary  bond  between 
God  and  the  soul,  and  furnishing  the  deepest  spring  of  the  spiritual. 
Though  clouded  by  sin,  it  is  still  the  Godward  looking  eye  of  the 
soul.  It  is  thus  the  summit  faculty — the  topmost  blossom  of  the  reason, 
most  sharply  and  widely  separating  man  from  the  brute,  and  correlating 
him  to  the  divine.  The  blending  of  all  the  spiritual  faculties  in  one 
upward  flame  through  conscience,  is  faith. 

5.  Its  Action. — The  faith  sentiments  of  God,  spirit,  and  immortality 
are  their  own  grounds  of  assurance.  All  that  the  logical  and  presenta- 
tive faculties  can  do  for  it  is  to  find  confirmatory  and  illustrative  exam- 
ples. Primordial  truths  come  with  the  force  of  a  revelation  to  the  faith 
faculty.  Faith  comes  as  a  light  to  the  reason,  love  to  the  sensibility, 
energy  to  the  will.     In  modern  Germanic  philosophy  this  faith  facult)- 


232  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

in  its  activity  is  called  God  consciousness.  It  is  the  power  whereby  the 
spirit  spontaneously  apprehends  a  power  above  itself,  which  the  reason 
cognizes  as  absolute,  perfect,  and  infinite.  Faith  consciously  connects 
itself,  conditional  and  dependent,  to  its  originator  and  upholder.  Man 
has  this  conscious  assurance  that  he  is  thus  related  to  an  absolute,  per- 
fect, and  infinite  One.  This  conscious  correlation  of  fatherhood  and 
childship  thus  revealed  in  the  soul  is  one  of  the  most  intimate  and  assured 
of  all  the  spiritual  spontaneities.  In  its  gradual  unfoldings,  like  con- 
sciousness in  general,  it  is,  at  first,  an  intimation,  a  suggestion,  vague  and 
undefined  at  first,  perhaps,  but  very  genetic  and  fruitful,  unfolding  to  full 
faith  assurance,  thence  clarifying  by  degrees  into  an  idea  of  God,  or 
that  he  is,  gradually  unfolding  into  an  ideal  of  his  nature,  or  i<<Jiat  he  is 
This  God  consciousness  constitutes  an  original,  universal,  subjective 
revelation  of  God  to  man,  giving  him  a  self  or  experimental  testimony  of 
that  Spirit  in  which  his  own  spirit  lives  and  acts.  Through  sin,  man  has 
a  depraved  sense,  a  darkened  understanding,  and  a  dormant,  beclouded 
faith;  yet  it  reveals  the  divine  more  or  less  clearly  to  every  soul.  In 
proportion  as  man  is  freed  from  sin,  and  the  faith  faculty  restored  to  its 
normal  action,  and  illumed  by  the  divine  light  that  shines  into  the  hearts 
of  all  men,  is  God  revealed  to  and  through  our  own  spiritual  experiences 
in  the  revelation  of  his  fatherhood  and  the  soul's  sonship.  This  God 
sentiment  is  the  organ  for  religion.  In  the  pious  consciousness  God  is 
as  immediate  and  certain  as  its  own  self,  because  all  apprehensions  of 
self  are  truly  realized  in  and  through  the  apprehension  of  God.  Faith 
is  thus  an  affair  of  the  entire  being,  at  first  an  intuitional  sentiment,  then 
a  thinking,  then  an  acting,  in  a  word,  a  life.  Jacobi,  the  originator,  or 
the  reviver,  of  this  philosophy,  not  inaptly  termed  the  faith  philosophy, 
rejected  all  logical  proofs  of  Deity,  and  rested  directly  on  this  faith  assur- 
ance for  his  proof  of  Deity.  "There  lives  in  us,"  he  says,  "a  Spirit  com- 
ing directly  from  God,  and  constitutes  man's  most  intimate  essence." 
As  this  Spirit  pervades  man  in  his  highest,  deepest,  and  most  personal 
consciousness,  so  the  Giver  of  this  Spirit,  God  himself,  is  present  to  him 
through  the  heart  or  sentiments,  just  as  nature  is  present  to  him  through 
the  external  senses.  No  sensible  object  can  so  move  the  Spirit,  or 
so  demonstrate  itself  to  it  as  a  true  object,  as  do  those  absolute  objects, 
the  true,  good,  beautiful,  and  sublime,  which  can  be  seen  with  the  eye  of 
the  mind;  but  these  are  the  attributes  of  God,  as  color  and  hardness  are 
of  bodies.  We  may  hazard  the  assertion  that  we  believe  in  God  because 
we  see  him  with  our  spiritual  vision.  This  direct  seeing  of  God  is  the 
jeweled  crown  of  our  race,  the  distinguishing  mark-  of  huuianit}'.     With 


SERMONS.  233 

holy  awe  man  thus  gazes  directly  into  the  sphere  of  light,  into  the  pres- 
ence, yea,  into  the  face  of  God,  beaming  with  truth,  beauty,  sublimity, 
holiness.  Schelling  makes  man  to  have  his  being  in  God,  continually 
dwelling  in  him.  The  history  of  humanity  is  the  unfolding,  the  revela- 
tion, of  this  universe  of  God,  in  his  on-going  moral  order  and  harmony. 
On  the  completion  of  humanity,  and  only  then,  will  the  idea  of  God  be 
completely  manifested.  Schleiermacher  finds  God  in  the  sentiment  of 
dependence  in  which  man  at  once  recognizes  his  own  being  as  the 
dependent,  and  the  infinite  being  of  God  as  the  independent  one.  This 
is  the  ground  of  religion.  We  come  by  this  assurance  through  direct 
consciousness,  just  as  we  com.e  by  the  assurance  of  the  outward  world. 
As  the  eye  sees  the  world  by  means  of  light,  the  ear  hears  by  means  of 
sound  waves,  so  the  faith  faculty  sees  and  hears  God  through  the  medium 
of  the  Spirit  that  lightens,  the  Spirit  that  speaks  with  a  voice  of  soft  gen- 
tleness to  the  soul.  Hope  is  that  branch  of  faith  wherein  expectancy  is 
awakened  by  the  element  of  futurity  attached  to  its  assurances  of  good. 
Fear  is  the  element  with  the  assurance  of  evil. 

6.  IV/iat  Is  Religion  ? — Religion  is  the  divine  life  in  the  soul,  with 
its  inward,  free,  self-moving  principle,  wherein  the  divine  indwells  and- 
operates  in  the  human.  This  divine  life  was  humanized  in  Christ.  He 
comes  as  the  healer,  the  life-giver.  Salvation  is  life,  the  saved,  the  liv- 
ing. The  Saviour  is  the  life-giver.  The  life  of  Christ  becomes  a  hidden 
life  in  humanity,  to  reveal  itself  in  all  those  who  are  united  to  him  in  the 
vital  union  of  regeneration.  Christ  became  in  humanity  a  life-giving 
Spirit.  The  incarnation  was  not  simply  the  occasion  of  the  regenerating 
power  in  humanity.  It  is  this  power  itself  This  divine-human  life  is  a 
vital  principle  in  the  world.  Christians  are  not  simply  messengers  of 
truth,  examples  of  right  living,  but  rather  the  bearers  of  a  new  and  divine 
life.  "  He  is  life  in  their  life."  Christopheri,  Christ-bearers;  Theopheri, 
God-bearers,  as  they,  in  the  early  ages  of  the  church,  styled  themselves. 
The  theanthropic  life  of  Christ,  passing  over  to  his  disciples,  becomes  life 
in  them.  As  the  human  nature  of  Adam  passes  over  to  his  posterity,  so 
does  the  nature  of  Christ  pass  over  to  the  regenerate.  This  divine  life  in 
humanity  is  a  power  of  holiness  for  all — a  possibility  of  life — realized 
only  in  those  who  by  voluntary  act  place  themselves  in  connection  with 
this  life-power,  thus  becoming  sharers  of  this  divine-human  life,  partakers 
of  the  divine  nature.  This  divine  or  God  life,  unchangeable  as  God  is, 
perfect  as  he  is  perfect,  consciously  raising  above  worldly  perturbations 
by  a  living  union  with  God,  penetrating,  spiritualizing,  sanctifying,  pro- 
ducing the  external  righteousness  of  works  from  an  internal  righteous" 


234  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

ness  of  a  divine-human  life  acting  as  a  living  law,  becoming  to  the 
individual  a  new  creation,  releasing  its  possessor  from  guilt,  giving  rec- 
onciliation, harmony,  and  peace.  Regeneration,  or  being  born  of  God 
through  Christ  by  the  Spirit,  gives  vital  connection  through  the  faith- 
faculty,  whereby  the  life  of  the  divine  Spirit  lives,  grows,  and  fructifies  in 
the  human  spirit,  descending  through  spirit,  soul,  body,  filling,  governing, 
exalting,  sanctifying  the  whole  person.  In  this  salvation  the  restoration 
is  not  wrought  so  much  for  us  as  in  us.  Human  nature  must  be  re-ingen- 
erated  with  divine  life  in  order  for  this  healing  and  spiritual  health — 
reconnected  with  the  divine,  in  order  to  be  leavened  with  this  new  life. 
This  union  is  effected  by  the  indwelling  of  the  Spirit.  Christ  is  received 
when  his  Spirit  is  received.  We  have  his  life  when  we  have  his  Spirit — 
the  Spirit  of  life.  Religion  is  not  simply  a  knowledge,  a  doctrine,  an 
objective  faith  or  dogma,  but  a  life.  The  union  of  each  regenerate  soul 
with  God  through  Christ  is  not  simply  moral,  legal,  or  federal,  but  organic 
and  vital,  partaking  thus  of  Christ's  righteousness  not  by  imputation  or 
substitution,  but  rather  by  impartation,  thence  imputed,  not  instead  of, 
but  for  the  soul's  own  righteousness,  being  its  own  through  this  vital 
union.  Whoever  receives  the  impartation  of  this  divine-human  life  by 
the  Spirit  through  faith  is  lifted  into  all  of  its  prerogatives  and  blessings^ 
freed  from  the  pollutions  of  sin  and  the  condemnations  of  guilt.  This 
impartation  of  the  Christ-life  by  the  Spirit  and  its  reception  through  the 
faith  organ  of  the  soul,  is  an  impartation,  at  the  same  time,  of  his  holiness. 
This  incorruptible  seed  in  the  soul  transmutes  the  corruptible  into  the 
incorruptible,  the  sinful  into  the  holy,  by  a  glorious  and  divine  alchemy. 
As  the  divine  fire  descended  upon  the  sacrifice  of  Elijah  and  consumed  sac- 
rifice, wood,  and  water,  transmuting  them  all. into  fire,  so  acts  the  holy  flame 
upon  the  nature  of  man.  Justification,  therefore,  is  no  arbitrary  act  account- 
ing a  sinful  one  as  holy  by  an  outside,  commercial, or  substitutional  transac- 
tion, but  rather  by  an  internal  process  of  purification  first.  The  divine  life 
in  our  souls  justifies  through  indwelling  righteousness,  imparted  before  it 
is  imputed.  The  righteousness  of  Christ  appropriated  by  the  faith-organ 
becomes  a  part  of  the  inner  life  of  the  believer,  a  new  and  living  principle. 
The  Holy  Spirit  is  the  common,  vital  principle,  received  thus  into  the 
human,  the  Christian  becoming  thus  organ  for  the  Christ-life.  Regener- 
ation is  the  birth  of  this  divine  principle  in  the  soul.  Faith  is  the  instru- 
ment, the  medium  of  operation.  By  it  is  restored  the  life  lost  by  sin. 
Holiness,  thus  entering  the  soul  as  a  living  principle,  sanctifies,  and  thereby 
justifies.  Pardon  results  from  the  regenerating  act.  The  regenerated 
one  is  mat/c  innocent,  guiltless,  rather  than  pronounced  so.     Pardon  is 


SERMONS.  235 

thus  an  efficient  act  rather  than  a  declaratory  act — through  and  by  a  liv- 
ing, purifying  process,  rather  than  a  declaratory  judicial  transaction  ab 
extra.  Thus  righteousness  is  not  a  commercial,  judicial,  declaratory  act, 
according  to  the  mechanical,  trading,  or  governmental  theories  of  ration- 
alizing Protestantism,  nor  an  infused  state  according  to  Romanism,  but  a 
living  process,  whereby  death,  decay,  the  impurities  of  sin,  and  conse- 
quent guilt,  are  eliminated  by  holy  or  divine  life-power.  The  Spirit  comes 
livingly  into  the  soul  in  the  new  birth  through  the  faith-faculty,  and,  by 
direct  internal  illumination,  enkindles  in  the  soul  new  light,  life,  and 
power.  It  is  by  the  witnessing  of  the  Spirit  in  our  spiritual  consciousness, 
revealed  as  a  present  and  living  salvation  from  the  power  and  guilt  of  sin. 
This  gives  the  "assurance  of  faith,  the  spirit  of  adoption,  crying,  'Abba, 
Father.'  " 

7.  God-Consciousness  as  Christian  Faith. — God-consciousness  becomes 
Christian  or  saving  faith  when  man  finds  true  life  in  communion  with 
God,  through  the  Logos.  Faith,  when  it  is  touched,  vivified  by  the  Spirit, 
becomes  illumed,  and  living,  and  loving.  Grace  is  God's  imparting 
love;  faith  is  man's  accepting  love.  This  union  makes  the  recipient  a 
participant  of  the  Divine -human,  the  Christ-life,  in  one  word.  Christian, 
to  be  more  and  more  transformed  by  this  living  principle  thus  entering 
by  the  faith-faculty.  The  root  of  this  divine  life  in  the  human  is  faith,  of 
which  hope  and  love  are  the  branches.  Herein  is  satisfied  the  craving  of 
the  soul  for  personal  insight  and  assurance,  a  possession  of  the  truth  by 
an  immediate  or  experimental  knowledge.  Vital  religion  has  a  self-attest- 
ing proof  By  faith  we  become  partakers  of  the  divine  nature.  It  gives 
a  realizing  sense  of  salvation  as  a  living  reality.  Religion  thus  becomes 
a  vital  and  practical  experience,  not  a  theoretical  and  mechanical  system. 
Not  dogmatic  formula  and  assertion  and  logical  syllogism,  with  their 
lifelessness,  is  what  the  soul  wants,  but  present,  self-attesting  proofs,  a 
vital  relationship  and  communion  of  the  soul  with  the  divine.  This  is 
religion,  the  Holy  Spirit  coming  as  a  h'ving,  loving  power  into  the 
soul,  not  a  conviction  of  the  understanding  by  evidence  in  the  form  of 
historical  testimony,  not  an  external  canon  of  inspiration,  though  never 
so  carefully  constructed  with  the  balance  of  probabilities,  though  they  be 
two  or  ten  to  one  in  favor  of  the  present  canon  of  Scripture.  The  ulti- 
mate basis  of  religious  certainty  must  be  in  divine  communion  and  life, 
for  which  we  were  created;  the  objective  argument  is  simply  introductory, 
confirmatory,  illustrative  of  this  internal  assurance.  Religious  certainty 
is  not  the  inferences  of  logic,  or  the  credence  of  historic  testimony,  but 
immediate,  and  living,  an  experimental  assurance  by  a  personal   relation 


236  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

of  the  soul  to  God,  not  miracles  without,  and  in  the  past,  but  a  miracle 
present  and  within.  Religion  is  the  conscious  presence  of  the  Spirit  in 
the  soul,  regenerating,  justifying,  sanctifying,  and  ultimately  glorifying — 
a  present,  living,  and  perpetual  miracle.  It  is  Christ  living  thus  in  the 
very  core  and  essence  of  self-consciousness. 

8.  Hotv  Can  We  Knotv  the  Historical  Christianity  xvith  Its  Founder  to 
Be  of  God?—T\i\?,  is  the  vital  question.  Questions  of  the  canon,  its  extent 
and  inspiration,  are  secondary  and  dependent  on  this  primal  one.  Must 
we  depend  on  historic  testimony  for  all?  Is  salvation  assured  to  us  on 
no  higher  grounds  than  historic  testimony?  Lessing  says:  "This,  this  is 
the  foul,  broad  ditch,  over  which  I  cannot  get,  often  and  earnestly  as  I 
have  attempted  to  leap.  Can  anyone  help  me  over,  let  him  do  it;  I 
beseech  him;  I  adjure  him.  He  deserves  from  me  a  divine  reward." 
But  Lessing  was  doomed  to  live  and  die  without  being  helped  over.  So 
have  thousands  of  others.  Help  cannot  come  from  human  agencies. 
The  help  must  be  that  divine  help  which  this  historic  Christianity  was 
instituted  to  reveal.  The  purity  of  the  Hebrew  and  Greek  texts,  the 
extent  and  limit  of  the  canon,  the  authenticity  and  genuineness  of  the 
books  of  this  canon,  depending,  as  they  all  do  and  must,  in  their  ultimate 
analysis  or  uninspired  historic  testimony  and  uninspired  exegesis  for  the 
meaning  of  the  same,  can  never  satisfy  the  highest  want  of  the  soul  nor 
meet  the  deepest  doubt.  This  all-satisfying  help,  this  ultimate  test  and 
ground  of  assurance,  comes,  and  comes  alone,  in  the  reality  of  the  inward, 
spiritual,  individual  soul-life  of  everyone  born  into  the  kingdom  of  God, 
becoming  biographical  in  each  pious  life,  and  historical  in  the  common  con- 
sciousness and  experience  of  the  Christian  church.  Every  true  believer 
has  the  conscious,  experimental  assurance  that  he  has  a  new  life-power 
living  in  and  through  him.  As  when,  from  the  outward  presentation  of 
physical  bread  for  the  satisfying  of  physical  hunger,  we  partake  on  the 
testimony  that  it  will  meet  our  physical  necessity,  and  are  satisfied,  not 
only  satisfied  but  find  our  physical  life,  health,  and  strength  renewed, 
invigorated,  so  when  through  historical  and  cotemporaneous  testimony 
we  are  induced  to  drink  of  the  water  of  life  and  eat  of  the  bread  of  life, 
we  find  our  spiritual  life  renewed,  invigorated,  and  our  spiritual  nature 
pervaded  by  a  divine  satisfaction.  All  who  have  partaken  of  this  divine 
bread  have  found  their  soul-hunger  abundantly  satisfied,  just  as  assuredly 
as  physical  bread  satisfies  physical  hunger  and  gives  strength.  They  who 
have  drunk  of  these  living  waters  find  that  they  slake  soul-thirst  and 
transform  the  soul  itself  into  a  living  fountain.  All  such  knowledge  is 
immediate  and  e.xperimental.     All   external,  logical,  and   historic  testi- 


SERMONS.  237 

mony  becomes  confirmatory.     The  Christ  within  the  soul  is  the  highest 
and  most  assuring  proof  of  the  Christ  without.     The  Spirit  living  and 
operating  in  the  soul  is  the  highest  proof  of  the  Spirit  given  on  the  day 
of   Pentecost.     "Christianity,"   says  Coldrige,  "finds  me  in  the   lowest 
depth  of  my  being,  as  no  other  system  can.     It   meets  there   my  direct 
needs."     Every  external   revelation  of  the  divine  will  presupposes  the 
inner  one  in  the  conscience  to  respond  to  it,  otherwise  the  outer  cannot 
be  known  and  accepted  as  the  divine.     External  or  historic  revelation  is 
necessary  to  supply  the  light  of  truth  to  feed  the  faith-life,  as  sunlight  is 
necessary  to  feed  the  plant  life ;  but  there  must  be  the  internal  or  subjec- 
tive life  to  receive,  appropriate,  and  assimilate  the  outward  or  objective. 
The  soul  is  constitutionally  the  subject  of  divine  indwelling  and  influence. 
Christ,  in  his  person  in  the  incarnation,  and  by  the  sending  of  the  Com- 
forter after  his  departure,  left  not  his  children  orphans,  but  has  comeback 
and  made  his  abode  with  them.     Without  Christ  and  the  indwelling  Spirit 
humanity  is  incomplete;  but  with  this  indwelling,  man  is  restored  to  that 
communion  with,  and  participation  in,  the  divine,  for  which  he  was  orig- 
inally created.     Christ,  standing  without,  knocks  at  the  door  of  the  faith- 
faculty  or  conscience.     We  arise  and  let  him  in,  and  he  abides  with  us— 
within  us.     Christian  piety  or  faith  in  its  Christ-life  is  an  inward  certainty 
of  salvation,  and  the  assurance  of  a  personal  Saviour  in  this  redemption, 
which,  connecting  itself  with  the  historical  Christ,  gives  the  assured  cer- 
tainty of  his  divinity.     His  Spirit  witnessing  with   our  spirits  gives  the 
assurance  of  his  objective  reality.     There  may  be  innumerable  uncertain- 
ties, historical  and  dialectical,  but  the  ultimate  fact  of  redemption   rests 
upon    an    assurance   of  life  as  immutable  as  any  other  science.     The 
supreme  strength  of  religious  faith  is  the  indubitable  experience  of  a  spir- 
itual life,  satisfying  all   the  religious   needs  of  the  soul.     The  sense  of 
forgiveness,  reconciliation,  the  beatitudes  of  communion  with  God  in  this 
new  and  holy  life,  with  the  joyful  hopes  of  eternal  life,  have  transformed 
the  lives  of  thousands,  enabling  them  to  die  joyfully  in  the  assurance  of 
its  realities.    It  is  not  a  theoretical,  but  an  experimental  salvation,  whereby 
the  soul  knows  that  it  is 

"  Disburdened  of  its  load, 
And  swells  unutterably  full 
Of  glory  and  of  God." 


IS  a 


9.  Inspiration. — Inspiration,  in  its  most  typical  or  generic  sense 
perpetual   divine  inbreathing,  through  the  faith  faculty,  giving  spiritual 
power,  life,  health,  to  the  ever  ingrowing  spiritual  life.     In  this  generic 


238  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

sense,  inspiration  is  the  fountain  of  all  religious  life,  an  ever  present  energy 
in  all  spiritual  experience,  the  source  of  all  spiritual  knowledge  and  power. 
This  God-inbreathed  life  thus  entering  the  soul,  generating  and  ingrowing 
through  the  whole  spiritual  being,  quickens,  vivifies  the  entire  spiritual 
nature,  yet  is  limited  and  modified  by  the  individual  in  which  it  lives; 
hence  its  outgrowth  and  fruitage  are  neither  entirely  human,  nor  wholly 
divine,  but  partake  of  the  nature  of  both,  being  thus  a  divine-human. 
This  outgrowth  also  varies  as  vary  the  individuals.  The  more  divine  the 
life  the  greater  is  the  inflow  of  the  Spirit,  resulting  in  a  more  perfectly 
divine  human  character.  The  great  typical  divine-human  life  of  all  was 
Christ's — the  most  divine  of  all,  the  most  human  of  all.  All  children  of 
God,  "partakers  of  the  divine  nature,"  are  patterned  after  this  archetype. 
The  generic  unfolding  of  this  inspired  or  inbreathed  life  is  in  what  are 
termed  the  Christian  graces,  called  by  Paul  the  fruit  of  the  Spirit, — "love, 
joy,  peace,  long-suffering,  kindness,  goodness,  faithfulness,  meekness, 
temperance."  This  fruitage  is  not  human  entirely,  not  divine  entirely,  but 
a  divine-human.  The  seminal  principle  is  divine,  the  nurture  is  human, 
the  fruitage  is  divine-human.  Again,  this  fruitage  varies  as  individuals 
vary,  so  that  in  one  the  characteristic,  highest,  and  best  fruitage  is  love ;  in 
another,  joy;  in  another,  peace  ;  in  others,  long-suffering,  gentleness,  good- 
ness, faith,  meekness,  temperance.  The  quality  as  well  as  the  kind  of  fruit 
differs  in  individuals  of  like  spontaneities  or  temperaments,  so  that  the 
love,  faith,  or  goodness  of  no  two  individuals  are  precisely  alike.  This  is 
the  inspiration  of  life  or  character  restoring  the  normal  state  of  the  soul, 
purifying,  exalting,  illuming  the  life.  We  next,  by  adding  something 
new,  ascend  from  graces  to  gifts.  Graces  convert  truth  or  principles 
already  possessed  objectively  into  life  and  character.  Gifts  add  to  the 
truths  already  possessed,  or  make  new  or  special  application  of  known 
truths  for  the  use  of  others  for  their  edification  or  improvement,  perfect- 
ing them  in  the  graces.  Inspiration  of  character  or  graces  and  of  uses 
or  gifts  are  generically  alike;  otherwise  it  would  need  a  new  inspiration  to 
interpret  one  to  the  other.  Inspiration  of  gifts,  like  those  of  character, 
must  be  a  union  of  the  divine  and  human.  It  is  still  an  inworkingof  the 
divine,  hence  a  divine  human  outworking.  That  is,  a  scripture,  God- 
inspired,  is  not  a  dictation  in  a  mechanical  mode,  to  or  through  a  passive 
medium  from  without,  but  rather  it  is  inbreathed  into  the  very  texture 
and  being  of  the  recipient,  thence  expressed  from  the  very  essence  of  his 
Spirit,  thus  empowered  and  illumed.  The  first  result  is  diversity  of  gifts, 
as  Paul  calls  them,  springing  from  the  same  empowering  Spirit.  To  one, 
wisdom;  to  another,  miracle-working  power;  to  another,  prophecy;  to 


SERMONS.  239 

another,  diversities  of  tongues;  but  all  of  the  selfsame  Spirit  working 
in  and  through  them.  By  this  same  inspiration  Abraham  was  led  out 
and  became  the  father  of  the  faithful;  Moses,  a  leader  and  lawgiver; 
Bezaleel,  the  cunning  artificer;  Joshua,  the  skillful  chieftain ;  Deborah,  a 
noble  patriot  and  deliverer;  David,  the  sweet  singer;  Solomon,  the  wise; 
Isaiah,  the  sublime  poet  prophet;  Elijah,  the  thunderbolt  of  destruc- 
tion; John,  the  contemplative,  semi-mystic  apostle;  Paul,  the  intense, 
enthusiastic  worker  and  sharp  logician  ;  Luther,  the  reformer;  Wesley, 
the  renovator;  Howard  and  Nightingale,  angels  of  mercy;  Penn,  the 
apostle  of  peace. 

There  results,  also,  not  only  variety  of  operations  in  kind,  but  like- 
wise in  quality.  That  is,  truths  of  the  same  kind,  expressed  by  different 
persons,  will  be  shaded  and  tempered  by  their  individualities,  so  that 
Isaiah,  Jeremiah,  John,  and  Peter  would  all  express  the  same  truth  with 
different  hues  of  coloring,  like  the  pure  white  light  penetrating  a  prism, 
is  unraveled  and  thrown  out — not  in  abstract  whiteness,  but  rainbow 
hued.  In  these  inspirations  those  individuals  best  adapted  to  secure  the 
results  sought  are  used.  If  it  be  the  nobler  sentiments  that  are  to  be 
awakened  and  illustrated,  then  the  Spirit  moves  a  soul  full  of  all  human 
sympathies  and  sweetness.  If  if  be  pure  truth  that  is  to  be  revealed,  then 
a  calm,  clear-visioned  nature  speaks;  if  activities  are  to  be  aroused,  then 
a  divinely  energized  soul  of  power  arises.  The  teachings  of  Christ  are 
full  of  the  truth  of  this  living  revelation  and  growth  and  power.  This 
divine  life  is  a  leaven,  a  seed,  a  growth.  "  I  am  the  vine,  ye  are  the 
branches."  These  and  many  others  teach  the  living  connection  between 
God  through  Christ  and  his  children,  and  its  growing,  fructifying  power. 

10.  Faith  as  Life-Power. — Faith  in  these  living  processes  satisfies 
Paul's  definition  as  the  very  substance,  essence,  living  reality  of  things 
hoped  for,  the  evidencing,  the  internal  manifesting  of  things  unseen. 
The  trust  element  in  faith  is  the  full  and  free  surrender  by  the  will  of  the 
whole  being,  to  the  faith  object.  When  the  emotional  nature  has  been 
favorably  affected,  when  the  faith  assurances  have  awakened  responsive 
emotions  of  approval,  and  love  has  been  enkindled,  then  the  will  thus 
motived  carries  the  whole  being  over  in  glad  surrender,  and  reliance  or 
leaning  upon  and  devotement  to  God.  Piety  is  thus  the  embodiment  of 
faith  in  trustful  love  and  glad,  filial  obedience,  joyful  service,  lifting  its 
recipient  from  the  moral  to  the  religious.  It  is  thus  the  fruitage  of  com- 
munion of  the  divine  with  the  human,  filling  the  soul  with  divine  life  and 
superhuman  power.  This  faith-life  diffuses  itself  down  through  all  the 
departments  and  avenues  of  our  being,  vivifying  the  conscience,  sweeten- 


240  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

ing  the  affections,  purifying  the  sentiments,  illuming  the  reason,  energiz- 
ing the  will,  subduing  the  passions,  and  glorifying  the  body,  thus  attuning 
all  the  lower  forces  of  being  harmoniously  and  symmetrically  to  the 
highest,  becoming  thus  at  once  the  life  of  all  spiritual  graces,  the  basis 
of  all  noble  culture,  the  inspiration  to  all  labor.  It  lifts  above  the  merely 
moral  or  legal  state,  wherein  all  virtue  is  outward,  mechanical  self-restraint 
and  punctiliousness,  resulting,  at  best,  in  a  tranquil,  self-poised,  self- 
centered  state,  to  that  state  wherein  all  is  devoted,  sacrificial,  inspirational, 
full  of  the  elevations  of  self-forgetting  love,  and  the  supernatural  energy 
of  a  faith-life. 

In  this  Christed  life,  or  divine-human  life,  wherein  Christ  says, 
"I  in  them,  they  in  me,"  with  his  indwelling  life  working  out  in  all  the 
thoughts,  feelings,  and  willings,  all  selfism  disappears,  all  mere  moral- 
ity or  legal  virtue  disappears,  being  transmuted  into  a  life  centered  in 
the  divine  life,  swayed  by  divine  inspirations,  wherein  the  outward  pres- 
ence of  legality  or  temptation  is  no  more  felt,  being  superseded  by  the 
higher  and  positive  forces  of  this  divine  enthusiasm.  Faith  is  the  most 
central  uplifting  power  of  the  soul.  Love  is  but  faith  working  down  into 
the  emotional  and  affectional  forces  of  the  soul,  and  touching  thus  upon 
the  springs  of  the  will.  It  is  a  world-accepted  maxim  that  knowledge  is 
power,  but  faith  is  a  greater  power.  A  faith  moving,  working  by  love 
is  the  great  power  in  the  world's  spiritual  elevation  and  progress.  What 
indifference,  listlessness,  downright  laziness  pervades  humanity  for  want 
of  faith  in  God  and  his  eternal  principles,  in  life  with  its  eternal  destinies 
and  limitless  possibilities.  Nothing  is  so  chilling,  so  benumbing,  as  doubt, 
skepticism.  Better  burn  in  the  fires  of  fanaticism  than  freeze  in  the  tor- 
pers  of  unbelief  In  the  old  Persian  religion  the  first  and  distinguishing 
characteristic  between  angels  and  devils  was  the  former  had  for  their 
formula  "I  believe,"  the  latter,  "Perhaps."  Many  a  soul  lying  listless  in 
the  dormancy  of  "  perhaps,"  would,  if  touched  by  the  inspirations  of  belief, 
faith,  spring  to  life  and  activity.  As  springs  to  work  a  sleeping  world, 
when  the  heralds  of  morning  shout  from  the  eastern  hilltops  the  approach 
of  a  new  day,  so  would  such  souls  touched  by  faith,  leap  to  their  work. 
What  light,  day,  is  to  the  world,  such  is  faith,  enlightened  by  truth,  to  the 
soul.  As  living  faith  dies,  spiritual  power  dies,  and  there  remains  but  the 
cold,  dreary  sleep  of  doubt,  disturbed,  it  may  be,  now  and  then,  by  fitful 
dreams. 

Faith  is  the  seed  from  which  grows  all  ideal  living  and  right, 
manly  acting,  wherein  all  faith  assurances  are  lived  out  into  realities. 
It  quickens  and  gives  depth  and  elevation  to  all  life's  aims.     The  clear 


SERMONS.  241 

and  far-reaching  sweep  of  its  "solemn  visions"  lifts  living  above  all  time- 
serving, and    assumes  the    majestic    proportions  of  eternal  relationship. 
No  man  can  be  entirely  great  without  a  clear-visioned  faith.     A  living 
faith  is  full  of  presence,  poise,  calmness^  self-surrender.      It    is    creative, 
affirmative,  direct,  attracting,  centralizing,  monopolizing.     It  gives  bold- 
ness, purpose,  specific  and  lofty,  glow,  enthusiasm,  solemnity,  nobility. 
It  sees  the  ongoing  providences,  and  follows  their  lead,  making  life  easy 
and  strong.     The  strength  of  the  divine  providences  becomes  his  strength. 
The  great  faith  spontaneities  of  humanity  are  the  "  inspirations  of  the 
Almighty."     A  man  resisting  these  spontaneities  is  mad,  floating  blindly, 
listlessly  upon  them ;  he  is  imbecile ;  but,  making  way  for  them  and  leading 
on  with  aspiration  and   endeavor,   he  becomes  noble.     The  innate    and 
supreme  aspiration  of  faith  is  oneness  of  life  and  aim  with   Deity.     This 
is  attained  only  as  the  divine  comes  into  the  human,  and  lifts  up  the 
human  to  the  divine.     A  divine  and  living  feith,  which  touches  all  the 
springs  of  love,  lifts  the  soul  with  winged  hope,  tends  to  give  a  life  full 
of  all  nobility,  efficiency,  self-forgetting  and  sweetest  sympathy,  a  world- 
reaching  philantrophy,  a  life  more  sublime  than  Niagara  or  Alps,  more 
beautiful  than  the  flowers  of  many  springs,  more  lovely  than  sunrises  or  • 
sunsets.     It  is  the  ladder  whereby  the  angels  of  God  are  descending  to 
the  human,  and  ascending  from  the  human  to  the  divine.     Humanity 
without  faith  is  but  one  great  troubled  heart,  trembling,  palpitatmg,  voic- 
ing itself  in  sobs  and  wails,  struggling  against  the  inevitable — death. 

The  universe  is  shrouded  in  mists,  and  the  blackness  of  darkness — no 
light,  no  air— all  oppressive,  stifling,  suffocating.  The  assurances  of  faith 
rift  the  clouds;  light  and  air  and  life  break  in,  hope  and  joy  sing  in  the 
human  soul.  This  substance  of  hope,  this  direct  evidence  of  the  unseen, 
has  been  the  source  of  all  divine  living  in  this  world.  It  enabled  the 
fathers  to  obtain  a  good  report;  it  was  the  excellency  of  Abel's  sacrifice; 
it  translated  Enoch  ;  it  made  Noah  a  successful  sailor,  and  the  father  of 
the  new  humanity;  it  made  Abraham  the  father  of  the  faithful,  Moses  the 
liberator  and  lawgiver,  and  that  long  line  of  worthies  who  through  faith 
subdued  kingdoms,  wrought  righteousness,  obtained  promises,  stopped 
the  mouths  of  lions,  quenched  the  violence  of  fire,  escaped  the  edge  of 
the  sword,  out  of  weakness  were  made  strong,  waxed  valiant  in  fight, 
turned  to  flight  the  armies  of  the  aliens,  restored  the  dead  to  life.  Others 
were  tortured,  mocked,  scourged,  imprisoned,  stoned,  sawn  asunder,  were 
tempted,  were  slain  with  the  sword.  Others  wandered  in  deserts,  in 
mountains,  lived  in  dens  and  caves,  clothed  in  sheepskins  and  goatskins, 
being  destitute,  afflicted,  tormented,  of  whom  the  world  was  not  worthy, 


16 


242  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

but  obtained  a  good  report  with  God  and  all  good  angels  and  men.  Faith 
gave  heroism  to  the  Christian  martyrs,  reformatory  power  to  Luther, 
nonconformity  to  Cromn^ell  and  his  compeers,  inspiration  to  Milton,  genius 
to  Bunyan,  organific  method  to  Wesley,  persuasive  eloquence  to  Whit- 
field, victory  to  Joan  of  Arc,  guidance  to  Columbus,  expatriation,  a  new 
world,  a  new  nation,  and  a  new  liberty  to  the  Puritan  Pilgrims.  "Faith 
working  by  love "  inaugurated  the  modern  missionary  spirit,  which  is 
radiating  all  the  dark  corners  of  the  earth,  as  a  divine  light,  is  building 
schools,  proclaiming  liberty,  equalit}^  and  brotherhood,  establishing  char- 
ities and  reformatories,  removing  ignorance,  superstition,  and  wrong.  It 
is  teaching  man  that  he  was  not,  in  the  language  of  the  Roman  poet, 
simply  "born  to  consume  the  crops,"  to  live  in  the  limited  and  paltry 
circle  of  his  daily  wants  and  gains,  appetite  and  gratification,  but  to  live 
above  and  beyond  the  little  circle  of  self,  out  on  the  broad  plains  of 
humanity,  and  to  climb  the  mountains  of  God  round  about. 

To  you  that  are  about  to  leave  this  Institution,  having  completed  your 
prescribed  courses  of  study,  permit  me  to  say  that  your  lives  can  never 
be  greater  than  your  faith.  Living  faith  in  God,  in  religion,  in  all  great 
and  sublime  truths,  is  the  only  nourishing  and  invigorating  principle  to 
great,  sublime,  divine  living.  Faith  alone  will  permit  the  seraphim  to 
descend  with  live  coals  from  the  altar  and  touch  your  lips,  your  words, 
your  lives  with  a  living,  purifying  fire,  enabling  your  whole  being  to  flame 
with  a  divine  radiancy.  Your  classics,  your  mathematics,  your  science, 
your  theology,  which  you  have  been  so  sedulously  seeking  through  these 
years,  are  as  dead  as  Ezekiel's  valley  of  dry  bones  till  inbreathed  with 
life  and  power  from  on  high.  A  life  with  a  Stephen-like  fullness  of  faith 
and  the  Holy  Ghost  is  the  all-conquering  life,  with  its  triumphant  death. 
It  opens  the  heavens;  it  sees  the  spirit-horsemen,  God's  forces,  encamped 
on  all  the  hills  of  life;  it  sees  God  in  all  providences.  Every  morning  is 
radiant  with  his  glory,  every  evening  lovely  with  his  love,  every  bush 
aflame  with  his  presence,  every  soul  has  the  image  and  superscription  of 
the  divine,  making  all  -events,  all  circumstances  of  life,  tend  to  a  final  tri- 
umph. "This  is  the  victory  that  overcometh  the  world,  even  our  faith." 
It  gives  that  "restful  peace  and  sweet  content"  which  the  world  can 
neither  give  nor  take,  passing  all  understanding — even  the  peace  of  God. 
"Wherefore  let  us  also,  having  so  great  a  cloud  of  witnesses  encompass- 
ing us,  laying  aside  every  weight  and  sin  which  doth  naturally  enwrap 
us,  run  with  patience  the  race  that  is  set  before  us,  looking  unto  the 
Author  and  Perfecter  of  our  faith,  even  Jesus."     Amen. 


SERMONS.  243 


OBLIGATION    IMPOSED    BY    CULTURE. 
[Baccalaureate  sermon  before  the  graduating  class  of  Alfred  University,  June,  1880.] 
Romans  1:14,  "I  am  debtor  both  to  the  Greeks,  and  to  the  Barba- 
rians; both  to  the  wise,  and  to  the  unwise." 

''Noblesse  oblige''  was  the  motto  and  rallying  word  of  chivalric  times, 
for  quickening  the  sense  of  obligation  among  the  privileged  classes,  the 
nobility  in  general,  to  the  rest  of  mankind.  It  was  surcharged  with  the 
doctrine  that  great  opportunities  carried  with  them  great  responsibilities- 
Wealth,  position,  culture,  in  short,  power  in  any  form,  is  weighted  with 
the  debt  of  obligation. 

Paul,  I  apprehend,  had  a  "working  theory,"  a  living  conviction  of  this 
great  principle,  when  he  penned  the  above  passage.  Through  the  fore- 
most schools,  through  the  best.literatures,  through  travel  and  intercourse, 
through  all  best  opportunity,  and.  finally,  through  faith  in  Christ,  Paul 
had  received  the  highest  culture,  secular  and  religious,  of  the  age,  and  he 
declares  his  readiness  to  give  payment  to  the  best  of  his  ability,  to  preach 
the  gospel,  "the  power  of  God  unto  salvation." 

This  leads  up  to  the  theme  chosen  for  this  occasion.  The  obligation 
imposed  by  culture  is  that  of  a  working  good  will  to  mankind.  More 
definitely,  culture  is  obligated  to  be,  ever  and  everywhere,  an  evangelist, 
the  bearer  of  good  news  through  good  will  to  the  world. 

The  behests  of  duty  born  of  conscience,  the  divinest  faculty  of  the 
soul,  become  obligations  when  recognized  as  imposed  by  law.  It  is  the 
echo  of  that  voice  ot  soft  stillness  heard  by  Elijah  at  Horeb,  at  the  sound 
of  which  every  soul  of  right  attitude  stands  with  uncovered,  bowed  head 
and  unsandaled  feet.  It  is  the  pillar  of  cloud  by  day  and  of  fire  by  night, 
to  lead  on  the  obedient,  and  from  out  which  the  Shekinah  appears  to  the 
clear-visioned  soul.  Being  thus  of  divine  origin,  the  behests  of  obliga- 
tion are  sacred,  light-bearing,  life-giving,  lifting  the  otherwise  dead,  bar- 
ren universe  into  a  radiant  sphere  of  spiritual  realities  and  living  ener- 
gies. All  study,  and  knowledge,  and  culture,  and  work,  and  suffering, 
become  luminous  and  significant.  Obligation  is  thus,  in  its  very  nature, 
ennobling,  lifting  the  spirit  to  its  feet,  giving  backbone  and  muscular 
tension,  making  the  gristle  and  sinew  of  character  taut  and  strong,  which 
before  was  lax  and  flabby.  It  is  the  source  of  all  invigorating  activities, 
the  pole-star  to  all  right  living.  It  prevents  life  from  becoming  stale  and 
insipid,  and  gives  it  significancy  and  grandeur.  The  voice  and  aspect  of 
duty  have  nothing  soft  and  caressing,  but  rather,  like  Milton's  archangel, 
it  stands  solemn,  lofty,  heroic,  and  stern-eyed  and  far-looking,  and  with 


244 


LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 


voice    trumpet-toned,  lifting    the   listener  to    his  feet,  setting  the  blood 
coursing  with  new  vigor,  and  nerving  the  arm  with  heroic  power. 

Obligation  fulfilled  becomes  the  source  of  joys  the  most  healthful  and 
dignified.  No  life  guided  by  duty  can  be  groveling,  cloddish;  but  it  is 
thereby  touched,  uplifted,  strengthened,  and  made  sublime.  All  privilege 
is  noble  just  in  the  proportion  that  it  is  full  of  obedience  and  sacrifice  of 
purposeful,  helpful  work,  by  which  the  soul  becomes  transfigured  with 
a  divine  radiancy.  Obligation  regulates  liberty,  is  its  balance-wheel, 
steadies  *it  for  high  deeds,  gives  meaning  and  dignity  to  action,  glory  to 
achievement.  It  lifts  life  from  aimless  floating  to  aimful  sailing,  from 
insipid  vegetating  to  noble  endeavor.  The  obligations  imposed  by  cul- 
ture are  multiform,  wide  sweeping,  and  long  enduring. 

Youth,  health,  hope,  faculty,  culture,  are  the  grand  possessions  with 
which  you,  who  are  soon  to  graduate,  begin  life's  work.  This  high  pos- 
session, however,  comes  at  great  cost,  making  you  great  debtors,  with 
correspondingly  great  obligations.  Goethe  said,  "Each  bon  mot  has  cost 
me  a  purse  of  gold;  half  a  million  of  my  own  money,  the  fortune  I  inher- 
ited, my  salary,  and  the  large  income  derived  from  my  writings  for  fifty 
years  back,  have  been  expended  to  instruct  me  in  what  I  know."  Gibbon, 
for  his  great  history,  did  not  get  within  ten  thousand  dollars  of  what  the 
books  required  for  its  composition,  co.st  him.  Milton,  for  his  "Paradise 
Lost,"  into  which  he  had  wrought  the  best  of  his  multiform  enriched  life, 
received  only  seventy-five  dollars.  An  educated  person  is  an  expensive 
being;  but  a  truly  noble  one  is  worth  the  cost.  We  are  debtors  for  all 
we  have  and  are  to  a  wider  circle  of  toil  and  sacrifice  than  we  outwardly 
come  in  contact  with.  We  are  inheritors  of  all  the  accumulations  of  all 
the  ages.  They  have  all  labored,  and  we  have  entered  into  their  labors. 
Their  high  thoughts,  lofty  ideals,  noble  living,  great  deeds,  are  our  inher- 
ited possessions. 

A  college  is  an  abridged  edition  of  the  humanities,  an  epitomized 
schedule  of  nature,  a  compend  of  all  the  best  products  of  civilization,  a 
storehouse  of  all  known  truth,  an  armory  of  all  best  weapons  for  life's 
warfare.  The  foundations  of  most  of  these  have  been  laid  in  religion. 
Their  walls  have  gone  up  through  the  inspirations  of  high  and  unselfish 
aims,  every  stone  and  brick  and  board  and  nail  placed  with  prayer  and 
consecrated  toil.  Sacrificial  living  and  dying  are  the  cost  of  college 
equipments.  Every  leading  truth  taught  therein  represents  the  highest 
and  best  reaches  of  the  world's  most  masterful  minds — the  princely  gifts 
of  imperial  intellects. 

Jesus,  with  all  the  inspired,  devout  men  of  old,  lived,  suffered,  died  to 


SERMONS.  245 

give  a  religion;  all  philosophers,  with  "high  thinking  and  plain  living," 
have  furnished  the  philosoph}'.  All  poets  have  lit  up  the  mental  heavens 
with  their  poetic  inspirations;  all  historians  have  recorded  the  ongoings 
of  Providence,  governing  the  world;  all  mathematicians  have  labored  to 
set  forth  the  abstract  mathematical  truths;  all  astronomers  have  revealed 
the  immensities  and  the  glories  of  the  special  universe;  all  geologists  are 
revealing  the  mysteries  of  a  time-world;  all  scientists  of  whatever  depart- 
ment are  revealing  the  mysteries  of  God  in  nature;  all  inventors,  reform- 
ers, helping  on  civilization.  These  have  all  thought,  and  wrought,  and 
suffered",  and  died,  and  ye  have  entered  into  the  rich  fruitions  of  their 
lives.  Every  truth  of  mathematics,  literature,  art,  science,  law,  philosophy, 
every  principle  of  religion,  every  element  of  liberty  and  civilization,  has 
cost  toil  and  sacrifice,  and  some  of  them  untold  sacrifice.  These  great 
spirits  have  walked  the  way  of  tears  and  of  blood,  and  the  rich  clustering 
fruits  of  all  this,  you  have  been  garnering  during  these  long  years  of 
training.  Yourselves,  your  parents,  your  friends  who  have  helped  you 
on,  have  added  their  contributions  to  augment  the  costliness  of  )-our 
culture. 

What  is  this  culture  that  thus  costs? — All  perfect  culture  seeks  and 
gives  life,  health,  growth,  power,  tastes,  habits,  skill,  symmetry,  propor- 
tion, ennobling  and  perfecting  its  recipients.     It  is  earnest,  purposeful 
aggressive — full  of  the  streams  of  fresh,  free  thought.     It  is  ingrown  with 
the  sentiment  of  pure  soul-worth,  rising  above  all  outward  circumstances 
and  trappings,  wherein  being  and  doing  transcend  all  getting  and  having, 
these  sentiments  inwrought    into  all    the    fiber  and  texture  of  culture, 
enlarging  and  elevating  the  self-forgetting  and  appreciative  sympathies, 
rather  than  simply  sharpening  the  critical  acumen.     Noble  culture,  like 
noble  natures,  is  not  born  of  carping  criticism  and  envious  captiousness. 
It  is  open-eyed  tow^ard  beaut}^  and  nobleness,  but  blind  and  irresponsive 
to  all  that  is  contrariwise.     The  sheen  of  its  nobility  glorifies  all  \vithin  its 
luster.     As  the  great  musician  must  become  more  and  more  the  imper- 
sonated spirit  of  the  violin,  the  harp,  the  piano,  the  organ — in  short,  of 
all  harmonies — so  must  the  cultured  become  the  impersonated  spirit  of 
all  literatures,  sciences,  arts,  industries — all  ennobling  and  civilizing  proc- 
esses.    It  is  the  high  aim  of  all  true  culture  to  develop  all  the  perfection 
possible  through  a  training  which  enlightens  the  intellect,  restrains  the 
passions,  elevates  and  purifies  the  affections,  and  empowers  the  will.     It 
enables  one  to  enjoy  not  only  the  broader  truths  and  experiences  of  life, 
but  with  a  quiet  self-possession  appreciate  all  the  subtler  influences.     He 
can  discriminate  between  joy  and  joy,  sorrow^  and  sorrow,  love  and  love. 


246  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

career  and  career,  discoverin|j  in  all  the  events  of  life  their  beauty,  their 
pathos,  their  comedy,  or  their  tragedy.  Culture,  expanding  the  merely 
temporal  and  local  of  the  neighborhood  into  the  broader  sweeps  of  all 
times  and  places,  and  touched  by  all  human  interests  and  experiences, 
getting  thereby  a  sense  of  the  more  subtle  and  beautiful  colors  of  which 
life  is  capable,  and  realizing  how  fair  a  thing  it  may  be,  how  rich  in  har- 
monious coloring,  beauty  of  form,  many-sided  freedom,  self-forgetting 
friendships,  sacrificial  loves,  thus  opening  up  to  the  dusty,  everyday  life 
boundless  gardens  of  the  past,  with  their  rich  woods  and  waters  and  out- 
looks on  illimitable  seas,  open  to  us  the  undying  deeds  of  history,  with 
all  the  keener  and  profounder  passions  in  action,  the  exquisite  groups  of 
figures  with  their  splendid  living,  lifting  life  thereby  into  an  exquisite  and 
noble  reality,  enabling  us  to  appreciate,  sympathize  with,  and  absorb  into 
our  own  life,  all  the  scenes,  incidents,  and  teachings  of  everyday  life. 
Culture  enables  the  soul  to  yield  from  every  appulse  from  without,  a 
composite  harmony,  becoming  a  many-voiced  orchestra,  or  an  aeolean 
harp,  which  the  winds  of  life  play  upon,  touching  note  after  note  into 
delicate  music.  It  is  the  mission  of  culture  to  remove  the  mark  of  sense, 
the  mists  of  error,  and  all  dull-sightedness,  until  the  spiritual  world  dawns 
clear,  and  we  are  enabled  to  behold  ourselves  compassed  about  with 
chariots  and  horses  of  fire,  and  all  spiritual  relationships  and  affinities 
reveal  themselves.  A  new  truth  starts  responsive  lights  from  multitu- 
dinous other  truths. 

Again,  "The  light  of  a  high  ideal,"  as  F'ichte  well  says,  "is  more 
beautiful  than  the  sun,  and  above  all  orders  of  stars."  Culture  should 
not  only  make  clear  to  the  vision,  freed  from  all  cloud  and  murk  of  self- 
ishness and  materiality,  this  ideal,  but  likewise  gives  strength  and  cun- 
ning of  hand,  and  deftness  of  skill,  to  work  out,  in  and  upon  the  world, 
this  pattern  "seen  in  the  mount,"  without  which  one  will  only  be  an 
idealistic  dreamer.  Good  culture  sets  before  a  man  a  high  ideal  to  aim 
at,  becoming  a  control  and  an  inspiration  to  his  life,  and  training  all  his 
inward  powers  and  outward  instrumentalities  to  the  end  of  realizing  this 
ideal,  by  overcoming  all  obstructions,  surmounting  all  difficulties,  and 
enabling  him  to  use  all  the  utilities  of  life  for  this  ideal  realization.  Ideals 
beget  aspirations.  We  are  shaped  and  moulded  ultimately  not  by  rules 
and  precepts,  but  by  the  living,  governing  energy  of  our  ideals,  the  light 
of  our  lives,  the  inspiration  of  our  doing,  the  strength  of  our  endeavors. 
They  melt  and  fashion  the  metal  of  one's  being,  revealing  themselves  in 
all  he  thinks  and  does — being  thus  the  master  thought,  the  mainspring 
of  life.     These  ideals  have  material  or  spiritual,  selfish   or  unsefish,  ends. 


SERMONS. 


247 


It  is  the  aim  of  true  culture  to  supplant  all  selfish  and  material  ideals  by 
unselfish  and  spiritual  ones.  A  reasoning  being  implies  an  idealizing  one, 
and,  whatever  the  conditions  of  life,  in  order  to  save  it  from  being  sub- 
merged by  mere  animality,  it  must  have  a  pole-star,  to  prevent  it  from 
becoming  full 

"Of sad  dejection  and  dull,  sick  routine." 

Life  is  not  to  be  spent  in  vaporings  or  idle  dreamings,  nor  yet  absorbed 
in  pushing  one's  way  in  the  world,  maintaining  the  struggle  for  existence, 
inclosed  in  the  material,  hemmed  in  by  circumstance,  crushed  by  impe- 
rious necessity,  but  to  battle  up  through  them  to  the  higher  levels  of 
this  ideal,  divine  life.  Everyone  should  be  in  some  sense  a  bread  winner, 
that  is,  should  have  technical  or  professional  culture.  A  culture  that 
fails  to  set  one  squarely  on  his  feet,  and  give  him  two  strong  arms  and 
two  apt  hands,  fails  in  essential  points;  but  man  cannot  live  by  bread 
alone.  Any  culture  stopping  here  has  stopped  short  of  all  that  which  is 
noblest  and  best. 

"  Tlie  Immanitics  "  was  the  classical  name  given  to  all  higher  studies, 
pointing  to  the  broadening,  humanizing  influences  of  such,  "awakening 
a  desire  to  use  all  culture  for  the  good  of  humanity,"  as  the  child  of  God. 
This  is  the  noblest  end  of  living.  "Culture,"  in  the  language  of  Arnold, 
seeks  to  give  "  increased  sweetness,  increased  light,  increased  life,  increased 
sympathy."  It  must  often,  like  virtue,  be  its  own  great  and  sufficient 
reward,  giving  soul  freedom,  lifting  above  appearances,  seemings,  artifi- 
cialisms,  imitations,  idolatries,  to  all  divinest  ideals.  In  the  language  of 
the  German  poet,  then,  "Be  true  to  the  ideals  of  thy  youth." 

Again,  humanity  is  an  organic  unity,  and  is  destined  to  develop  and 
establish  itself  more  and  more  as  an  organism  through  the  conscious 
mutual  helpfulness  of  all  its  members,  as  a  common  bro'therhood,  striven 
for,  in  some  degree,  by  all  religions,  most  especially  by  the  Christian. 
Each  individual  has  an  additional  significancy  as  a  part  of  the  whole 
humanity,  or  brotherhood,  while  it  is  only  through  individuals  that  it 
can  receive  the  full  development  of  its  manifold  powers.  No  one  can 
realize  self-worth  till  he  has  realized  the  worth  of  humanity.  Human 
worth  comprehends  and  gives  significancy  to  personal  worth.  Personal 
nobility  is  the  outshoot  from  the  common  trunk  of  humanity.  There  is 
everywhere  in  this  humanity  so  much  that  is  latent,  such  unfathomed 
mysteries  and  possibilities  of  nobleness,  commanding  sympathy,  respect, 
effort.  Culture  has  been,  through  the  ages,  slowly  yet  surely  lifting  man 
to  higjier  civilizations.  High  religious  virtue,  empowered  and  guided 
by  high  culture,  is  the  lever  by  which  this  has  been  accomplished. 


248  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

Thus,  all  highest  and  truest  culture  springs  from  a  religious  root. 
The  best  culture  of  any  and  all  ages  has  been  that  which  has  led  up  to 
God,  and  the  best  possessor  and  user  of  this  was  the  best  scholar  and 
man  for  his  time,  and  the  best  student  is  he  who  strives  with  all  his  life 
to  attain  these  divinest  possibilities.  He  who  penetrates  and  is  penetrated 
by  the  divine  plan  and  purpose,  and  is  moved  and  motived  and  guided 
by  the  same,  is  the  one  of  highest  attainments.  To  him  the  world 
becomes  radiant  with  new  significancy.  As  all  true  life  is  in  God,  and 
acts  with  and  for  him,  so  does  all  true  culture.  To  this  end  all  partakers 
of  this  culture  must  labor,  that  this  blessing,  in  its  purest  and  best  pos- 
sible form,  may  be  spread  throughout  humanity,  not  merely  for  its 
utilitarian  results,  not  for  its  technical  knowledge  and  skill,  not  for  the 
professional  success  it  may  bring,  but  for  its  humanizing,  elevating,  and 
inspiring  effects.  Culture  is  not  simply  to  render  an  intelligent  being 
more  intelligent,  but  rather,  as  Wilson  and  Arnold  put  it,  "To  make 
reason  and  the  kingdom  of  God  prevail,  within  and  around  us,"  not 
simply  seeing  things  as  they  are  in  the  light  of  science,  but  by  seeking 
to  know  the  moral  order  of  the  divine  ideas  and  purposes  in  the  universe, 
and  conforming  and  helping.  Right  culture  seeks  the  highest  science, 
art,  literature,  in  order  to  make  them  tell  on  human  life  and  conduct.  It 
seeks  the  proportionate  and  harmonious  perfection  of  our  entire  per- 
sonality, to  the  end  of  seeking  the  same  in  entire  humanity.  It  is  not 
"a  having  and  resting,"  but  a  perpetual  growing  and  becoming,  through 
an  ampler  growth  and  more  human  expansiveness  of  each  personality 
for  the  sake  of  all.  The  peculiar  wealth  and  glory  and  dignity  of  culture 
are  that  no  perfection  arising  through  it  can  be  isolated,  purely  personal, 
but  overflows  on  to  all  human  nature.  Any  culture  which  does  not  lead 
outward  to  others  is  dwarfed,  deformed,  and  ignoble.  True  culture, 
then,  seeks  the  kingdom  of  God  within  and  without. 

Your  school  life  has  been  receptive,  full  of  routine  and  drill,  chafing 
restraints,  enforced  seclusion,  and  ungracious  discipline.  Upon  these  the 
stir  and  noise  of  the  world  break  with  a  crash  and  roar  as  of  great  waves 
on  a  far-off  shore,  awakening  dream  and  unrest.  Whether  the  outlook 
and  forecast  respecting  future  spheres  be  humble  or  exalted,  you  follow, 
with  pulse  quick  and  high,  the  lead  of  hope,  as,  with  radiant  countenance, 
she  beckons  forward  with  promise  of  happiness  to  all,  and,  perchance, 
laurel-crowned  brows  ere  the  sunset  of  life.  Not  infrequently  prepara- 
tion becomes  irksome;  longings  for  life-work  intensify.  This  preliminary 
gathering  of  knowledge,  discipline,  clearness,  and  versatility  is,  however, 
an  essential  condition  for  securing  growth  and  power,  to  be,  in  turn,  in 


SERMONS.  249 

their  future  outworkings  a  potent  influence  for  human  uplifting.  High 
aims  and  solemn  consecrations  need  to  be  embodied  in  steadfast  pur- 
poses, preparatory  to  going  forth  to  the  ampler  and  more  complex  and 
richer  culture  of  life. 

As  you  now  pass  from  anticipation  to  participation,  from  the  acqui- 
sition to  the  expression  of  power  in  use,  these  bright  visions  will  become 
very  earnest  realities.  Success  will  require  wisdom  in  aim,  prudence 
and  vigor  in  action;  otherwise,  youthful  dream  and  aspiration  will  end 
in  fog,  longing  in  fitful  and  fruitless  effort,  and  life  in  failure.  Not  a  few 
prepare  for  life  with  tlie  illusion  that  success  is  within  easy  grasp.  Dif- 
ficulties soon  dishearten  them.  Earnest  effort  soon  yields  to  restless 
discontent  or  stupid  inactivity,  the  result,  generally,  of  false  views,  ground- 
less anticipations,  insufficient  preparation,  or  misdirected  labor.  On  the 
other  hand,  if  life's  activities  are  entered  upon  after  careful  and  thorough 
preparation,  the  consciousness  of  preparedness  and  adaptability  to  one's 
calling  and  its  responsibilities  gives  that  lifesome  vigor  which  assures 
noble  achievement.  You  that  have  made  school  life  bright  with 
improved  opportunities,  rich  with  garnered  wisdom,  may  look  forward  to 
a  life  of  true  usefulness.  If  the  fields  of  youth  have  been  sown  with  the 
good  grain  of  true  culture,  then  will  the  reapings  of  age  be  rich  with  the 
golden  grain  of  true  glory. 

You  have  been  seeking  through  these  years  of  training  to  get,  not 
that  culture  which  is  chiefly  effective  in  small  criticisms,  with  a  keen 
turn  for  fault-finding  and  bookish  pedantry,  but  most  ineffective  in  all 
the  great  activities,  but,  rather,  that  culture  which  enkindles  sympathy, 
enthusiasm,  and  a  purpose  which  works  with  an  "intense  and  convinced 
energy."  Culture  is  coming,  more  and  more,  to  mean  that  quickness, 
depth,  and  force  of  the  entire  being,  not  to  be  obtained  solely  from 
courses  of  study,  nor  modes  in  class-room  drill,  but  rather  from  those 
pervasive  influences  which  go  to  make  the  present  livmg  tendencies  of 
civilization. 

You  now  go  to  that  life  culture  which  is  acquired  by  experience.  In 
experience,  abstract  and  theoretical  knowledge  becomes  ccHicrete  reality, 
and  is  the  most  satisfactory  and  permanent  knowledge.  It  gives  self- 
poise,  self-control,  head  wisdom,  heart  sympathy,  hand  skill.  Ulysses, 
that  many-experienced  and  wise  man,  said: — 

''I  am  part  all  I  have  met." 
To  become  thus  wise  in  all  sinless  e.xperiences  places  one  on  high  van- 
tage ground,  satisfying  some  of  the  noblest  aspirations  of  the  soul,  wiiile 
their  memories  awaken  emotions  tinged  with  the  grolden  haze  of  other 


250  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

years.  Herein  is  tlie  adv^antage  of  living  rightly  through  the  experiences 
of  a  long  life,  over  being  early  cut  off  from  them.  While  the  ever- 
changing  experiences  from  the  outward  world,  with  its  scenes  and  modes 
and  events,  may  be  sought  after,  yet  life,  to  be  rich  and  noble,  need  not 
necessarily  be  greatly  taught  in  these,  if  so  be  it  knows  the  deep  soul 
experiences  of  abiding  and  clear-eyed  faith,  that  cause  all  the  spiritual 
forces  to  mount  Godward,  with  their  sweet  .spirit  communings,  quick- 
ening into  self-renunciation,  solemn  consecrations,  and  unselfish  endeavor. 
These  are  the  topmost  flowerings  of  humanity,  and  no  culture  can  ignore 
these  fairest  and  highest  blossomings. 

As  you  go  forth  to  your  work,  you  need,  like  Milton,  to  feel  that  great 
work  can  be  achieved  only  "  by  devout  prayer  to  the  Eternal  Spirit,  who 
can  enrich  with  all  utterance  and  knowledge,  and  sends  out  his  seraphim 
with  the  hallowed  fire  of  his  altar  to  touch  and  purify  the  lips  of  whom 
he  pleases."  He  believed  that  to  this  must  be  added,  by  one's  self,  study, 
observation,  reading,  all  seemly  and  generous  arts  and  affairs.  He  who 
would  write  poems  "ought  himself  to  be  a  true  poem."  This  is  a  uni- 
versal principle.  Noble  doing  can  only  spring  from  noble  living,  and 
doing  that  thus  springs  will  command  attention,  respect,  and  a  following. 
Such  have  ever  been  the  ideal  heroes  of  humanity. 

Be  ever,  then,  light-seekers,  light-bearers,  light-givers.  The  poet 
siys: — 

"  Light  seeking  light  doeth  light  of  light  beguile." 

Truth  is — 

.   "The  life  of  whate'er  makes  life  worth  living— 
Seed-grain  of  high  emprize,  immortal  food. 
One  heavenly  thing  whereof  earth  hath  the  giving." 

Stand  upon  the  mountain  heights  of  progress,  with  watchful  eye,  to 
catch  the  earliest  dawn  of  any  new  truth  about  to  break  upon  the  world. 
Ever  listen  with  ear  fine-attuned  to  catch  the  divine  harmonies  of  any 
great  law  about  to  pulsate  out  from  the  infinite  harmonies  of  all  law  and 
order.  As  soon  as  the  new  truth  is  seen,  or  law  heard,  repeat  it  to  the 
waiting  world. 

Be  positives,  not  negatives,  affirming,  not  denying.  As  scholars,  with 
your  high  privileges,  and,  thereby,  large  duties,  you  need  to  rise  above 
all  negative  carpings,  and  choose  and  work  for  what  is  positive,  what  is 
affirmative,  what  is  advancing.  Truth  and  goodness  live  and  thrive  only 
on  these,  not  on  denying,  criticising,  negating,  not  on  snobbishness  or 
sniggerishness,  not  on  exclusiveness  respecting  others,  not  by  tearing 
down  others.  The  scholar  should  be  open-eyed  to  all  truths,  and  filled 
with  their  light;  he  should  flash  new  ideas  along  the  pathway  of  human- 


SERMONS.  251 

ity,  thereby  kindling  new  light,  awakening  nobler  sentiments,  and  inspir- 
ing to  higher  and  broader  activities.  You  are  not  to  be  simple  passivi- 
ties, complacently  receptive,  but  rather  be  felt  as  a  positive  and  controlling 
power.  Rather  guide  than  be  guided,  lead  than  be  led,  in  all  great,  benef- 
icent and  progressive  movements.  Freely  investigate  all  underlying 
principles,  all  overshadowing  laws,  governing  all  parties  and  sects  and 
institutions.  Be  friends  and  helpers  of  literature,  art,  science,  law,  gov- 
ernment, industry,  religion.  The  world  ever  tends  to  draw  down,  blunt, 
adulterate,  stultify;  hence  there  needs  to  be  a  counteracting,  lifting  up, 
purifying,  by  returning  often  to  the  fountains  of  culture,  clarifying  the 
vision  by  the  light  of  pure  truth. 

Sidney  says: — 

"The  shallows  murmur,  but  the  deeps  are  dumb." 
Seek  the  deep,  clear,  calm  waters  of  eternal  truth,  far  out  from  all  the 
murmuring  shoals  of  fanaticism  and  error,  and  all  shallow,  narrow  secta- 
rian or  party  living.  Disrobe  your  spirit  of  all  cant,  prejudice,  and  fetich 
worship.  Let  life  be  clean,  calm,  wholesome.  Then  its  free  forces  will 
become  manifest.  Spirit  freedom  and  independency  must  be  secured  at 
any  cost.     This  is  the  essence  and  core  of  all  noble  living. 

"On  the  neck  of  youth,"  sa}-s  an  oriental  proverb,  "sparkles  no  gem 
so  gracious  as  enterprise.'"  The  essence  of  enterprise  is  earnestness. 
This  is  always  contagious,  touching  and  lifting  to  their  feet  all  coming 
within  its  influence..  The  masterful,  conquering  spirit  is  he  whose  hand 
has  the  skill  and  power  to  execute  what  his  brain  plans,  the  ability  to 
make  his  ideals  realities.  Happy  he  whose  pleasure  is  his  work,  whose 
hand  skillfully  executes  his  plans.  Fortunate  are  those  who  have  given 
to  them  great  questions  to  solve,  new  truths  to  establish,  noble  principles 
to  inaugurate,  enduring  institutions  to  build.  Such  work  develops  very 
rapidly  the  latent  powers  of  the  workers.  If  they  are  sound  to  the  core, 
made  of  fine,  tough  fiber,  there  will  be  noble  and  lofty  characters  unfolded 
under  the  high  and  manifold  influences,  and,  not  infrequently,  intense 
activities  of  such  a  work.  Every  great  enterprise  must  encounter  dark- 
ness and  storm.  Fortunate  if.it  have  a  pilot  who  can  see  the  gathering 
tempest  before  it  breaks  in  its  fury,  and  courage  to  face  it.  If  unskillful 
hands  have  placed  the  noble  ship  in  a  false  position  by  ignorant  maneu- 
vering, where,  seemingly,  she  must  go  down  at  the  first  shock,  his  is  to 
warn  of  the  approaching  danger,  and,  amid  the  painful  suspense,  grasp 
firmly  the  helm,  and,  however  destitute  of  helps,  with  but,  perchance,  a 
single  ray  of  hope,  every  energy  absorbed  in  the  resolve,  the  ship  shall 
be  saved.     Others  may  betake  themselves  to  the  lifeboats;  he  will  share 


252  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

tlie  ship's  fate — sink  or  sail  with  her.     With  such  a  pilot,  the  vessel  is  very 
sure  to  outride  the  storm,  and  moor  in  calm  waters,  with  its  magnificent 
cargo.     Such  has  been  the  salvation  of  many  noble  enterprises  that  bless 
humanity,  and  call  for  thanksgiving. 
The  world  needs — 

"Strong,  still  men  in  this  age  of  cant, 
Who  can  work  but  cannot  sham." 

As  the  peasant  painter,  Millet,  puts  it,  needs  those  that,  free  from  all 
"posing,  unnaturalness,  exaggerations.  By  always  trying  to  put  one's 
self  in  some  other  one's  place,  and  talk  and  act  in  'character,'  one  loses 
the  just  appreciation  of  his  own  personality.  To  be  genuine  and  true  to  all 
the  high  art  and  noble  living,  all  theatrical  must  be  shunned."  To  be  able 
to  make  all  the  trivials  of  life  serve  the  expression  of  true  greatness,  this 
is  power.  Plutarch  well  says,  "It  is  not  always  in  the  most  distinguished 
achievements  that  men's  natures  may  be  best  discerned  ;  but  very  often 
an  action  of  small  note,  a  short  saying,  or  a  jest,  shall  distinguish  a  per- 
son's real  character  more  than  the  greatest  sieges  or  the  most  important 
battles."  The  world  needs  those  whose  culture  has  given  them  back  to 
themselves,  awakened,  strengthened,  and  made  completely  available  and 
noble  in  all  these  trivials.  It  needs  men  who  transmute  faith  into  life.  It 
needs  spiritual  Columbuses,  adding  new  realms  of  truth  and  mental  wealth. 
It  needs  God-inspired  men,  sailing  not  by  the  shiftful  winds  of  earth,  but 
by  the  steady  trade  winds  of  heaven.  The  soul,  simply  self-centered, 
self-purposed,  is  like  the  earth  obeying  its  geocentric  forces,  spinning  on 
its  own  axis,  ever  stationary,  or  wandering  darkling  out  into  space  and 
black  night;  while  the  God-centered  soul  is  like  the  same  earth,  sun- 
centered,  sweeping,  by  its  heliocentric  attractions,  its  grand  yearly  c}xles 
around  its  center  of  light,  life,  and  beauty,  and  being  borne  on  with  the 
sun  in  its  own  infinitely  grander  sweep. 
Finally,  as — 

"  We  touch  Christ,  in  life's  throng  and  press, 

The  healing  of  his  seamless  dress 

We  feel,  and  are  whole  again." 

So  all  lives  should  be  healing,  life-giving.  It  is  only  when  soul  speaks  to 
soul,  eye  to  eye,  smile  to  smile,  tear  to  tear,  that  this  power  is  fully  man- 
ifest. Then  lives  become  the  great  helps  to  other  lives.  They  are  the 
greatest  of  all  human  influences,  awakening,  as  they  do,  sentiment,  affec- 
tion, action.  They  are  the  masterful  forces  in  progress  and  civilization. 
Humanity  cries  out  for  noble,  inspirational  lives,  wherein  all  high  and 
holy  principles  are  inwrought  organically  into  character.     It  is  famishing 


SERMONS.  253 

for  lives  health)-  and  wholesome,  lives  struggli'ig-  up,  it  may  be,  from 
low  beginnings  to  high  stations  and  commanding  influences,  or  living 
nobly  and  grandly  in  obscurity,  greath'  good  in  all  humble  work-,  becom- 
ing lights  shining  down  through  the  vista  of  the  ages  to  guide  halting 
and  stumbling  feet.     Many  a  noble   life   is   lived    through   that    process 
whereby  it  is  poured  out,  drop  by  drop,  through  long  years  of  sacrificial 
libation,  in  that  grinding  attrition  by  which  it  is  worn  away  little  by  little, 
no  less  surely,  though  less  visibly,  than  if  dying  in  a  world-heralded  mar- 
tyrdom.    This  h  what   tries   the  patience  and   courage,  determines   the 
quality  of  the  metal,  as  in  the  refiner's  fire.     It  takes  more   courage  to 
stand  for  th;e  right  through  long  years,  regardless  of  opposition,  obloquy, 
and  negl'ect,  than  to  die  in  the  heat  and  strife  of  battle.     Humanity  needs 
the  inspiration  of  lives  that   attract   to   nobleness,  full    of  aspiration   and 
high  endeavor,  supported  by  the  power  of  achievement;  not  lives  that  tell 
only  or  mostly  of  outward  circumstance,  accidental  "distinction,  the  pomp 
and   splendor  of  office  and  station,  the  outward  polish   of  fashion,    but 
rs^ther  those  which  unfold  the  inner  workings  of  the  spirit,  the  processes 
of  thought,  sentiment,  will.     It  needs  lives  that  are  lived  upon  the  clear 
heights   of  sincerity,  open.-eyed,  calm-browed,  though   the  mists   gather 
and  darken  below,  awakening  in  others  the  impulse  to  pattern  after  their 
nobleness,  and  inducing  them  to  marshal  all  their  powers  in  subduing  all 
bad  influences  and  converting  all  into  triumphs.     The  world  needs  lives 
rich  in  culture,  attuned  to  sweetest  sympathy,  illumed   by  truths,  with  a 
sincerity  lucent  as  light,  full  of  spiritual  life  and  enkindling  enthusiasm. 
It  needs  such  as  have  faith  in  great  principles,  and  most  especially  in  the 
Author  of  these  principles,  with  the  high  trust  of  a  Noah,  the  faith  of  an 
Abraham,  the   meek    assurance   of  a   Moses,  the  zeal   of   the   prophet- 
reformer  Elijah,  all  those  great  spiritual  heroes  of  old,  whose  faith  lifted 
them  above  the  world,  with  all  its  low  forces.     How  do  such  lives  instruct 
the  world!     No  lives  in  court  or   palace  or   on  thrones   can   equal  those 
who,  out  of  want  and  suffering  and  persecution,  have  been,  through  the 
ages,  teaching  and  inspiring.     Give  lives  thus  patterned  and  empowered, 
and  great  will  be  the  achievements,— loyalty  to  truth,  allegiance  to  law 
secured,  culture  promoted,  the  evangelization  of  the  world  helped  on, 
civilization  advanced. 

Go,  then,  to  your  life-work,  with  good  will  as  the  inspiring  motive, 
"with  charity  for  all,  malice  toward  none."  Continue  through  life  seek- 
ing truer,  deeper,  wider,  higher  tastes  and  sympathies.  Follow  the  lead 
of  a  conscience  quickened  by  religion,  enriched  by  truth.  Continue  to 
seek  that  culture  which  lifts  into  religion,  and  that  religion  which  broad- 


2  54  LIFE    OF    PRESIDKNT    ALLEN. 

ens  into  a  many-sided  cii'ture.  Whether  famed  or  fameless,  recompensed 
or  recompenseless,  aboundMig  or  wanting,  go  forward  under  the  guidance 
of  the  behests  imposed  by  your  privileges.  And  may  the  benedictions  of 
the  All-Father  ever  encompass  and  protect  you.     Amen. 


THANKSGIVyiNG    SERMON. 
[Delivered  before  the  students,  and  others,  of  Alfred,  November  24,  1881.] 

Text. — "That  both  he  that  soweth,  and  he  that  reapeth,  n?ay  rejoice 
together."     John  4:36. 

I.  Origin  of  Tliaiiksgiving  Service. — The  Reformation,  under  Henry 
the  Eighth,  had  separated  the  English  from  the  Romish  Church,  and 
enfranchised  the  English  crown.  Elizabeth  enfranchised  the  Angli-can 
Church.  The  Puritans,  claiming  equality  for  the  plebeian  clergy, attemptt'd 
to  further  reform  the  liturgy,  ceremonials,  and  discipline  of  the  church, 
accepting  therein  no  authority  other  than  the  "pure"  word  of  God.  The 
Independents  discarded  all  church  hierarchy,  and  asserted  the  liberty  of 
every  individual  to  discover  for  himself  truth  in  the  word  of  God.  The 
Separatists  went  further.  "  Seeing  they  could  not  have  the  word  freely 
preached,  and  the  sacraments  administered  without  idolatrous  gear,  they 
concluded  to  break  off  from  the  public  churches,  and  separate  in  private 
houses." 

A  small  company  of  these  Separatists,  composed  of  simple  farmers 
and  tradespeople,  residing  in  the  north  of  England,  on  account  of  the 
intolerable  harrying  and  persecution  which  they  had  to  endure,  resolved 
to  flee  from  their  native  land.  First  seeking  refuge  in  Holland,  but  see- 
ing, among  other  dangers,  that  the  morals  of  the  rising  generation  were 
likely  to  degenerate,  if  they  remained  here,  they  sought  the  guidance  of 
God  to  "discover  some  place  unto  them,  though  in  America,  as  they 
desired,  not  only  to  be  a  means  to  enlarge  the  dominions  of  the  English 
estate,  but  the  church  of  Christ  also,  if  the  Lord  had  a  people  among  the 
natives  whither  he  would  bring  them."  They  pondered,  debated,  fasted, 
prayed,  and,  nerved  by  the  consideration  that,  though  "famine,-  and 
nakedness,  and  the  want,  in  a  manner,  of  all  things,  with  sore  sicknesses," 
threatened  them  in  such  a  venture,  yet  as  "all  great  and  honorable  actions 
were  accompanied  with  great  difficulties,  and  must  be  both  enterprised 
and  overcome  with  answerable  courage,  and  through  the  help  of  God, 
by  fortitude  and  patience,  borne  or  overcome;  yea,  though  they  should 


SERMONS.  255 

lose  their  lives  in  this  action,  yet  they  might  have  comfort  in  the  same," 
they  resolved  to  seek  a  home  in  America. 

Accordingly,  "such  of  the  youngest  and  strongest  as  freely  offered 
themselves,"  set  sail,  and,  after  a  long,  stormy,  and  perilous  voyage,  they 
planted  themselves  and  their  principles  on  Plymouth  Rock.  "1  see 
them,"  says  Everett,  "escaped  from  the  perils  of  the  sea,  pursuing  their 
all  but  desperate  undertaking,  and  landed,  at  last,  after  a  five  months' 
passage,  on  the  ice-bound  rocks  of  Plymouth,  weak  and  exhausted  from 
the  voyage,  poorly  armed,  scantily  provisioned,  without  shelter,  without 
means,  surrounded  by  hostile  tribes.  Shut  now  the  volume  of  history, 
and  tell  me,  on  any  principle  of  human  probability,  what  shall  be  the 
fate  of  this  handful  of  adventurers  ?  Tell  me,  man  of  military  science,  in 
how  many  months  were  they  all  swept  off  b}-  the  thirty  savage  tribes 
within  the  boundaries  of  New  P^ngland?  Tell  me,  politician,  how  long 
did  this  shadow  of  a  colony,  on  which  your  conventions  and  treaties  had 
not  smiled,  languish  on  the  distant  coast?  Student  of  history,  compare 
for  me  the  baffled  projects,  the  deserted  settlements,  the  abandoned 
adventures,  of  other  times,  and  find  the  parallel  of  this." 

"Do  you  not  think,"  asks  Choate,  "that  whoso  could,  by  adequate 
description,  bring  before  you  that  winter  of  the  Pilgrims — its  brief  sun- 
shine; the  nights  of  storms  slow  waning;  the  damp  and  icy  breath;  felt  to 
the  pillow  of  the  dying;  its  destitutions;  its  contrasts  with  all  their  former 
experience  in  life;  its  utter  insulation  and  loneliness;  its  death  beds  and 
burials;  its  memories;  its  hopes;  the  consultations  of  the  prudent ;  the 
prayers  of  the  pious;  the  occasional  cheerful  hymn,  in  which  the  heart 
threw  off  its  burden,  and,  asserting  its  unvanquished  nature,  went  up  to 
the  skies — do  you  not  think  that  whoso  would  describe  them,  calmly 
waiting  in  that  defile,  lonelier  and  darker  than  Thermopylae,  for  a  morning 
that  might  never  dawn,  or  might  show  them,  when  it  did,  a  mightier  arm 
than  a  Persian,  raised  in  act  to  strike, — would  he  not  sketch  a  scene 
of  more  difficult  and  rare  heroism;  a  scene,  as  Wordsworth  has  said, 
'melanclioly,  yea,  dismal,  yet  consolatory  and  full  of  joy;  a  scene  even 
better  fitted  to  succor,  to  exalt,  to  lead  the  forlorn  hopes  of  all  great 
causes,  till  time  shall  be  no  more  ? '  " 

Before  the  first  year  was  ended,  fifty-one,  just  half  of  their  number, 
had  perished,  twenty-eight  out  of  their  forty-eight  able-bodied  men.  At 
the  season  of  greatest  distress  there  were  but  seven  able  to  render 
assistance,  not  sufficient  to  take  care  of  the  sick,  scarce  able  to  bury  the 
dead.  "Warm  and  fair  weather,"  they  wrote,  came  at  last,  "and  the  birds 
sang  in  the  woods  most  pleasantly,  and  flowers  of  very  sweet  fragrance." 


256  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

As  best  they  could,  with  spade  and  hoe,  they  sowed  six  acres  with  barley 
and  peas,  and  planted  twenty  acres  of  corn.  The  peas  failed,  but  the 
barley  was  "  indifferent  good,"  and  "a  good  increase  of  Indian  corn." 
They,  consequently,  in  November,  1 621,  appointed  a  thanksgiving.  The 
governor  sent  out  a  party  to  hunt,  "that  so  the)'  might,  after  a  special 
manner,  rejoice  together  after  they  had  gathered  the  fruit  of  their  labors." 
For  three  days  they  entertained  and  feasted  Massasoit  and  some  ninety 
of  his  people,  who  made  a  contribution  of  five  deer  to  the  thanksgiving 
occasion.     Such  was  the  origin  of  this  now  national  festival. 

2.  Its  Significance. — What  was  the  significancy  of  this  thanksgiving 
to  them?  What  is  it  to  us?  To  them  did  it  signify  simply  gratitude  for 
the  failure  of  the  peas,  the  indifferent  good  yield  of  barley,  and  the  fair 
increase  of  corn?  To  us  is  it  rejoicing  over  merely  health,  abundant 
crops,  and  general  prosperity?  If  so,  both  to  them  and  to  us  its  signifi- 
cance is  low  and  groveling.  These  material  blessings  are,  indeed,  a  good, 
but  a  good  only  as  a  means  to  a  higher  end. 

Men,  souls,  should  be  the  aim  of  all  toil,  all  sowing,  reaping,  trad- 
ing, building,  gain-getting,  teaching,  preaching,  legislating,  governing. 
Epictetus  said:  "You  will  confer  the  greatest  benefit  on  your  city,  not  by 
raising  the  roofs,  but  by  exalting  the  souls  of  your  fellow-citizens;  for  it 
is  better  that  great  souls  should  live  in  small  habitations  than  that  abject 
slaves  should  burrow  in  great  houses." 

Our  text  suggests  a  rejoicing  together  in  a  higher  species  of  sowing 
and  reaping  than  springs  from  any  material  grain.  May  not  thanksgiv- 
ings likewise  be  radiated,  transfigured,  and  dignified  by  those  high  aims 
to  which  peas  and  barley  and  corn  are  but  means?  All  material  labors, 
gains,  and  interests  are  charactered  by  their  ultimate  uses.  Aims  con- 
stitute the  spiritual  alchemy  which  transmutes  all  means  into  gold  or 
dross.  Vigor,  valor,  nobleness,  mental  abilities,  spiritual  dignities,  these 
are  the  high,  ultimate  aims. 

The  turkeys,  for  instance,  which  are  so  soon  to  become  the  thank 
offering  of  the  more  favored  ones,  will,  in  the  mysterious  alembic  of  life, 
be  transformed  into  living,  human  vigor,  that,  on  the  morrow,  will  be 
translating  Latin  and  French,  Greek  and  German,  solving  mathematical 
and  metaphysical  problems;  will  be  singing  and  painting,  rhetoricating 
and  debating;  some  will  be  farming,  building,  railroading,  trading,  specu- 
lating; some  others,  poor  fellows,  will  be  lying,  cheating,  stealing,  swear- 
ing, and  all  that  sort  of  thing.  Thus  the  selfsame  sacrificial  turkey  will 
come  to  high  or  ba.se  ends,  just  according  as  the  human  absorbing  it  is 
motived  by  noble  or  ignoble  aims. 


SERMONS.  257 

Plymouth,  Forefathers',  or  Pilgrim  Rock,  as  another  illustrative  sym- 
bol, that  hard  syenitic  granite  bowlder  some  six  or  eight  feet  in  diameter, 
itself  a  pilgrim,  in  the  far-back,  glacial  period  brought  and  deposited  in 
the  shingle  at  the  edge  of  the  bay,  and  forming  the  stepping-stone  of  the 
Pilgrim  Fathers,  as  they  passed  from  ship  to  shore,  has,  from  this  momen- 
tary contact,  been  lifted  from  the  common  to  the  sacred.  No  other  sim- 
ple rock  on  this  round  world  has  connected  with  it  such  patriotic  asso- 
ciations as  this. 

At  the  dawning  of  the  Revolution,  the  people,  to  quicken  the  enthu- 
siasm for  independence,  attempted  its  removal  to  the  town  square,  for  the 
purpose  of  erecting  over  it  a  liberty  pole.  In  this  attempt  the  rock  split 
asunder.  This  was  quickly  interpreted  as  an  omen  foretelling  the  separa- 
tion of  the  colonies  from  the  mother  country.  Leaving  one  portion,  the 
other  part  was  drawn  by  twenty  yoke  of  oxen  to  the  town  square. 
Recently,  an  elaborate  and  costly  monument  has  been  erected  over  the 
portion  at  the  water's  edge. 

President  Dwight,  of  Yale  College,  wrote  in  his  day:  "This  rock  has 
become  an  object  of  veneration  in  the  United  States.  I  have  seen  bits  of 
it  carefully  preserved  in  several  towns  of  the  Union.  Does  not  this 
sufficiently  show  that  all  power  and  greatness  is  in  the  soul  of  man  ? 
Here  is  a  stone  which  the  feet  of  a  few  outcasts  pressed  for  an  instant, 
and  the  stone  becomes  famous.  It  is  treasured  by  a  great  nation.  Its 
very  dust  is  shared  as  a  relic.  And  what  has  become  of  the  gateways  of 
a  thousand  palaces?     Who  cares  for  them?" 

Visiting  this  rock  once,  I  found  other  visitors  picking  up  pebbles 
along  the  shore,  and,  after  laying  them  on  the  rock  for  a  moment,  taking 
them  thence  to  their  homes  as  sacred  relics.  After  much  labor  I  obtained 
a  few  small  pieces,  but  in  so  doing  left  fragments  of  other  rocks  used  in 
the  breaking.  Next  day,  on  my  way  to  the  funeral  of  Daniel  Webster, 
at  Marshfield,  I  saw  these  fragments  in  the  possession  of  individuals 
attendant  on  the  funeral,  who  were  taking  them  home,  to  be  handed  down 
to  other  generations  as  sacred  things. 

As  Plymouth  Rock  is  that  symbol  of  the  highest  reaches  of  pilgrim 
Puritanism  ;  as  the  Kaaba  stone  is  symbol  of  Moslemism,  in  its  devoutest 
Mecca  pilgrimages ;  as  the  Yule  log  was  symbol,  in  the  old  Norse  wor- 
ship, of  the  returning  sunlight,  with  all  its  glory  and  beneficence;  as 
the  Hebrew  feasts  were  symbols  of  Hebrew  theocracy;  as  the  eucharist 
and  the  cross  are  symbols  of  the  sacrificial  death  of  Jesus — so  is,  or 
should  be,  Thanksgiving,  symbol  of  .spiritual  and  political  independency. 

3.    This  Spiritual  Independency  the  Gcrvi  of  Our  Free  Institutions.— 


17 


250  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

It  is  the  germ  from  which  have  sprung  a  free  nation,  a  free  church,  a  free 
school,  a  free  press,  and  a  free  ballot.  When,  on  the  22d  of  November, 
1620,  the  Mayflower  landed  the  Pilgrims  on  Plymouth  Rock,  it  planted 
the  germ  of  all  these  and  more.  True,  these  Pilgrims  were  all  unconscious 
of  this,  were  themselves  narrow  and  persecuting.     Bryant  well  says: — 

"  They  little  thought  how  pure  a  light. 

With  years,  should  gather  round  that  day; 
How  love  should  keep  their  memories  bright; 
How  wide  a  realm  their  s(3ns  should  sway!  " 

The  impulse  to  their  migration  was  purely  spiritual,  "to  la)^  some  good 
foundation  for  religion."  They  declared  themselves  "agreed  in  nothing 
further  than  in  this  general  principle,  that  the  reformation  of  the  churgh 
was  to  be  endeavored  according  to  the  word  of  God.  Let  this  reforma- 
tion come  in  God's  measures,  and  as  he  himself  will  shape  it."  This 
simple  purpose,  nevertheless,  made  its  inception  more  sublime,  as  its 
progress  has  been  grander  than  any  of  the  colonizations  of  Phoenicia, 
Greece,  or  Rome,  grander  than  any  of  the  mighty  migrations  that  over- 
ran the  ancient  world,  grander  than  any  other  modern  colonizations. 

Carlyle  bids  us:  "  Look  now  to  American  Saxondom,  and  at  that  little 
fact  of  the  sailing  of  the  Mayflozver.  It  was  properly  the  beginning  of 
America.  There  were  straggling  settlers  in  America  before;  some  mate- 
rial as  of  a  body  was  there,  but  the  soul  of  it  was  this.  These  poor  men, 
driven  out  of  their  own  country,  and  not  able  to  live  in  Holland,  deter- 
mined on  settling  in  the  New  World.  Black,  untamed  forests  are  there, 
and  wild,  savage  creatures,  but  not  so  cruel  as  a  star  chamber  hangman. 
They  clubbed  their  small  means  together,  hired  a  ship,  the  little  ship 
Mayflozver,  and  made  ready  to  set  sail.  Hah!  These  men,  I  think, 
had  a  work.  The  weak  thing,  weaker  than  a  child,  becomes  strong,  if  it 
be  a  true  thing.  Puritanism  was  only  despicable,  laughable,  then;  but 
nobody  can  manage  to  laugh  at  it  now.  It  is  one  of  the  strongest  things 
under  tlie  sun  at  present." 

John  Robinson,  their  pastor  at  Lyden,  considered  the  father  of  church 
independency,  in  his  farewell  address  to  the  Pilgrims,  assumed  a  position 
two  hundred  years  in  advance  of  his  times,  and  struck  the  keynote  to  all 
religious  progress.  "I  am  confident,"  he  says,  "that  God  hath  more 
truth  yet  to  break  forth  out  of  his  word.  I  cannot  sufficiently  bewail  the 
condition  of  the  reformed  churches,  who  have  come  to  a  period  in  reli- 
gion, and  will  go  no  further  than  the  instruments  of  their  reformation. 
The  Lutherans  cannot  be  driven  to  go  beyond  Luther;  for  whatever  part 
of  God's  will  he  hath  further  imparted  by  Calvin,  they  will  rather  die  than 


SERMONS.  259 

embrace  it;  and  so  also  the  Calvinists  stick  where  Calvin  left 'them— a 
miser)'  much  to  be  lamented,  for,  though  they  were  both  shining  lights  in 
their  times,  yet  God  hath  not  revealed  his  whole  will  to  them.  Remem- 
ber your  church  covenant,  whereby  you  engage  with  God  and  one  another 
to  receive  whatever  light  shall  be  made  known  to  you  from  his  written 
word." 

The  Pilgrim  Fathers  originally  had  no  political  ambition  or  purpose; 
yet  before  they  had  landed  from  the  Mayfloivcr,  necessity  compelled  them 
to  form  themselves  into  a  body  politic,  by  adopting  the  following  solemn, 
voluntar)'  compact,  which  was  the  germ  of  our  independence  and  consti- 
tutional freedom : — 

"  In  the  name  of  God,  amen.  We,  whose  names  are  underwritten, 
.  do,  by  these  presents,  solemnly  and  mutually,  and  in  the  presence 
of  God,  and  one  another,  covenant  and  combine  ourselves  together,  into 
a  civil  body  politic,  for  our  better  ordering  and  preservation,  and  further- 
ance of  the  ends  aforesaid;  and,  by  virtue  thereof,  to  constitute' and 
frame  such  just  and  equal  laws,  ordinances,  acts,  constitutions,  and  offices, 
from  time  to  time,  as  shall  be  thought  most  convenient  for  the  general 
good  of  the  colony.     Unto  which  we  promise  all  due  submission  and 

obedience." 

"There's  a  divinity  within 
That  makes  men  great  where'er  they  will  it. 
God  works  with  all  who  dare  to  win.'' 

4.  Favoring  Conditions  for  the  Groivth  of  These  Principles.— The  Puri- 
tans were  Anglo-Saxons.  When  Gregory  the  Great  saw,  in  the  slave 
market  at  Rome,  the  Anglo-Saxons  which  the  Roman  legions,  had  con- 
quered, he  exclaimed,  "  Not  Angles,  but  angels,"  and  resolved  to  go  as  a 
missionary  to  these  beautiful  people.  Being  baffled  in  this,  he  afterwards 
sent  Augustine,  with  forty  other  missionaries,  to  England,  to  convert 
these  "angels"  to  Christianity.  "The  fair  Saxon,"  says  Emerson,  "with 
open  front,  and  honest  meaning,  manly,  domestic,  affectionate,  is  not  the 
wood  out  of  which  cannibal,  or  inquisitor,  or  assassin  is  made,  but  he  is 
moulded  for  law,  lawful  trade,  civility,  marriage,  the  nurture  of  children, 
for  colleges,  churches,  charities,  and  colonies."  The  Purit&ns  constituted 
the  anthology  of  this  fine  race,  composed  of  flowers,  plucked  from  the 
topmost  branches. 

Deity,  who  hath  determined  the  times  and  the  bounds  of  the  habita- 
tion of  all  nations,  appointed  the  Pilgrims  a  habitation  preeminently 
adapted  to  germinate  and  grow  the  essentials  of  all  republican  institutions. 
Infertile,  rock-ribbed,  river-veined,  sea-sculptured,  storm-swept  regions 
have  generally  been  the  ones  where  the  quickening  powers  of  all  the  best 


26o  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

civilizations  have  had  their  birth.  The  great  prophets,  lawgivers,  philoso- 
phers, poets,  orators,  initiators,  whose  thoughts  and  deeds  have  led  the 
world,  have  generally  had  their  spring  in  such  lands  as  Palestine,  Greece, 
Scotland,  Switzerland,  Prussia,  England,  New  England. 

5.  Other  Sowers  and  Other  Seed-Grain. — Whilst  the  nation  has  been 
reaping  the  harvest  from  these  Puritan  seedings,  multitudinous  other  sow- 
ers have  been  broadcasting  over  the  land.  Millions  of  other  peoples  and 
kindreds,  seeking  a  home  here,  are  mingling  the  strene  of  their  blood  with 
that  of  the  Pilgrims.  Migrations,  revolutions,  institutions,  customs,  man- 
ners, principles,  doctrines,  creeds,  arts,  sciences,  literatures,  religions,  are 
sowing  here,  with  open  and  free  hand,  wheat-seed  or  tare- seed.  All  the 
dead  generations,  all  the  dead  nations,  have  left  seed-grain  for  all  the  new 
generations,  for  all  the  new  nations.  Each  epoch  of  human  history  gath- 
ers unto  itself  the  fruitage  of  all  the  preceding,  enriched  and  advanced 
thereby.  Each  successive  age  is  the  harvest  home  of  all  its  ancestral 
ages.  It  is  the  mission  of  each  age  to  produce  better  seed  grain  than  the 
old,  for  the  future.  All  its  discoveries,  and  inventions,  and  improve- 
ments, all  its  culture  and  progress,  are  seedings  cast  into  the  fruitful  soil 
of  the  future,  to  spring  up  and  fruit,  some  thirty,  some  sixty,  some  an 
hundred-fold,  to  be  perpetuated  with  ever-increasing  fullness  and  variety. 
Its  influence  upon  itself  is  small  compared  with  its  influence  upon  the 
future.  Men  with  men  are  like  the  oaks  of  the  forest,  hurtling  their 
gnarled  branches,  without  bending  or  swaying;  but  the  upgrowing  sap- 
lings are  easily  swayed  and  fashioned.  This  swaying  and  fashioning  is 
the  high  privilege  and  solemn  responsibility  of  the  present  to  the  future. 

Greece,  with  its  era  of  greatness  barely  covering  a  period  of  two  hun- 
dred years,  and  holding  sway  over  an  insignificant  area  of  the  earth's  sur- 
face, has,  by  its  free  spirits,  .seeking  individual  perfections,  with  the  free 
play  of  all  their  faculties,  according  to  aptitude  and  genius,  and  by  the 
culture  of  reason  and  taste,  given  to  the  world  fruits  as  enduring  as 
humanity;  an  inspiration  and  guide  to  taste  and  art;  the  germ  of  all 
philosophies,  sciences,  and  literatures.  We  are  to-day  rejoicing  in  their 
enriching  and  ennobling  influences. 

Rome,  through  tumult,  and  storm,  and  bloody  tempests,  bequeathed 
to  the  world  the  genius  of  government  and  administrative  sovereignty, 
the  worth  of  principles,  formulated  into  laws,  of  organized  order,  the 
majesty  of  law,  reverence  for  authority,  the  nobleness  of  love  of  country 
the  sacrificial  nature  of  patriotism. 

The  Asiatics,  amid  crushing  despotisms,  lifted  the  veil  of  infinitudes, 
bowed  reverently  before  their  mysteries,  and  sowed  the  world  with  reli- 


SERMONS. 


261 


gion.  The  Hebrews,  a  branch  of  these,  gave  the  world  Monotheism,  a 
personal  God,  imposing  his  behests  upon  the  consciences  of  men,  the 
worth  and  dignity  of  spirit,  the  independency  of  soul,  to  stand  erect  and 
superior  to  all  outward  authority,  and,  through  Christ,  supreme  love  for 
the  Father  of  spirits,  and  good  will  to  men.  The  early  church  fructified 
humanity,  with  its  devotions,  faith,  sacrifice,  and  saintliness.  All  these 
the  ages  have  taken  up,  preserved  and  perpetuated  for  us.  We  are  receiv- 
ing their  fructifying  influences.     Are  we — 

"  Competent  to  keep 
Heights  that  they  have  been  competent  to  win?  " 

"  Not  that  our  age  excel 
In  pride  of  life  the  ages  of  our  sires. 
But  that  we  think  clear,  feel  deep,  bear  fruit  well." 

6.  Harvest  Home. — Students,  in  closing,  permit  me  to  speak  a  few 
words  especially  to  you.  You  are  in  the  harvest-home  period  of  life. 
You  are  here  to  gather  in  the  rich  sheaves  of  knowledge,  ripened  in  all 
the  fields  of  the  past;  to  glean  from  all  times,  and  climes,  and  sowings; 
drink  from  all  fountains;  eat  of  all  fruitings;  and  grow  into  all  that  is 
beautiful,  true,  noble,  and  good.  For  this  high  end  have  all  the  great 
and  unselfish  toilers  of  the  past  wrought. 

Sixteen  years  after  the  landing  of  the  Pilgrims,  and  six  after  the  set- 
tling of  Boston,  Harvard  University  was  founded.  "After  God  had  car- 
ried us  safe  to  New  England,  and  we  had  builded  our  houses,  provided 
necessaries  for  our  livelihood,  reared  places  for  God's  worship,  and  settled 
the  civil  government,  one  of  the  next  things  we  longed  for,  and  looked 
after,  was  to  advance  learning,  and  perpetuate  it  to  posterity."  To  its 
building  everyone  contributed,  according  to  his  means;  money,  goods, 
sheep,  cotton  cloth,  pewter  flagons,  dishes,  spoons,  a  peck  of  corn,  beads, 
wampum.  The  old  alchemists  sought  in  vain  for  the  elixir  that  would 
change  all  things  into  gold.  These  men  discovered  that  divine  elixir 
which  converted  their  wampum  and  spoons  and  pewter  flagons  into 
radiant  shafts  of  light  to  stream  down  through  the  ages,  lighting  not  only 
their  posterity,  but  all  coming  within  their  sweep.  Winckelried  gathered 
into  his  bosom  the  sheaf  of  foreign  spears  to  make  way  for  the  liberty  of 
Switzerland.  Gather  ye  thus  into  your  souls  a  sheaf  of  these  shining 
shafts,  and  transmit  their  glory  augmented  to  your  successofs. 

November  11,  1647,  the  General  Court  of  Massachusetts,  to  the  end 
"that  learning  might  not  be  buried  in  the  grave  of  the  fathers,"  passed  an 
ordinance,  inaugurating  the  first  common  school  system  which  the  world 
had   known— a   system  that  is  gradually  yet  surely  spreading  over  the 


262  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

earth,  and  will  as  surely  light  all  kindreds  and  peoples  up  to  higher  planes 
of  civilization. 

Young  friends,  you  have  had  your  being,  lived,  and  moved,  in  the 
radiancy  of  that  light  which  thus  first  dawned  in  Massachusetts.  How 
have  you  improved  its  privileges?  This  is  the  way  boys  went  to  school 
in  Shakespeare's  time: — 

"The  whining  schoolboy  with  his  satchel, 
And  his  shining  face,  creeping,  like  snail, 
Unwilling,  to  school." 

How  many  of  you  have  gone,  are  going,  that  selfsame  way  to  school  ? 
It  is,  nevertheless,  an  encouraging  thought  that  not  a  few  just  such  boys 
have  turned  out  to  be  Archimedean  levers  for  moving  the  world.  How 
many  of  you  will  prove  to  be  such  levers? 

In  1700  ten  clergymen  met  to  consult  in  reference  to  founding  a  col- 
lege in  Connecticut,  and  closed  by  laying  each  a  few  volumes  on  the  table, 
saying,  "I  give  these  books  for  the  founding  of  a  college  in  this  colon)'." 
These  were  the  fitting  germs  of  Yale  College,  which  has  grown  in  propor- 
tions and  in  power  one  liundred  and  eighty  years,  and  is  ju.st  in  its  youth- 
ful vigor.  Indeed,  college  germs  seem  to  have  an  immortal  vigor,  both 
of  growth  and  of  reproductiveness,  in  them.  Man)^  other  colleges  have 
been  the  outgrowth  of  Yale.  Her  influence  has  reached  far  and  wide. 
Each  one  of  you  has  doubtless  received  growth  and  vigor  from  her. 
Pythagoras,  on  discovering  a  new  theorem  in  geometry,  sacrificed  a  heca- 
tomb of  oxen  as  a  thank  offering  to  the  gods  for  granting  to  him  such 
high  privilege  and  honor.  Show  your  thankfulness  for  privileges  far  sur- 
passing those  of  Pythagoras,  not  by  burnt  offerings,  but  b\-  helping  to 
promote  learning  in  future  years,  when  all  such  interests  will  be  in  }-our 
keeping. 

When  the  world  was  young,  men  like  Enoch,  Noah,  Nimrod,  Abra- 
ham, Ishmael,  Moses,  stood  out,  individual,  columnar,  and  grand,  and  we 
see  their  giant  forms  shadowy  against  the  darkening  sky  of  the  past,  and 
feel  their  influence  sweeping  around  us;  but  now,  owing  to  the  leveling- 
up  influence  of  education  and  the  equalizing  of  power  b}'  liberty,  men 
perpetuate  their  influence  and  power  best  b}'  combination,  by  organiza- 
tion, by  founding  and  building  up  institutions  that  shall  grow  more  and 
more  vigorous,  as  the  centuries  go  by.  Preeminent  among  such  institu- 
tions are  colleges;  preeminent  also  are  they  for  their  wide-sweeping  and 
uplifting  influences. 

A  vine  which  had  climbed  to  the  top  of  a  cedar  in  a  single  season, 
e.xultingly  exclaimed,  "What,  O  cedar,  after  a  hundred  years  no  taller 


SERMONS.  263 

than  I  after  a  sinole  summer!"  "True,"  replied  the  cedar,  "but  after  you 
shall  have  been  dead  a  thousand  years,  I  shall  still  be  standing  and  grow- 
ing." Men  are  to  institutions  what  vines  are  to  cedars.  Transmute, 
then,  young  friends,  your  life  power  into  institutions  that  shall  grow  and 
bear  fruit  through  the  millenniums. 

To  this  end  gather  into  your  souls  during  this  harvest  period  all 
ennobling,  life-giving,  fructifying  forces  possible.  Make  the  most  and 
best  of  yourselves,  to  the  end  that  you  may  broadcast  the  world,  in  your 
future  sowings,  with  the  best  possible  seed. 

Rules  and  tutors  alone  cannot  educate.  All  true  education  must  have 
a  subjective  spring.  As  the  organific  life-power  of  the  seed  appropriates 
the  helpful  conditions  of  earth,  air,  water,  heat,  light,  into  growth  and 
fruitage,  so  may  you,  by  personal  vigor,  gather  soul-growth  from  every 
rule  of  restraint  or  guidance,  help  of  teacher,  problem  of  mathematics, 
lesson  of  language,  truth  of  science,  from  all  social,  converse,  all  rub  of 
experience,  success,  failure,  joy,  sorrow.  God,  in  his  divine  husbandry, 
has  sown  the  fields  of  the  universe  thick  with  grain  of  inexpressible  vari- 
ety and  richness,  from  which  his  children  can  glean  full  handed.  With 
open-eyed  search  you  will  find  rich  gleanings  of  truth,  beauty,  and  love. 
Their  sheen  illumines  every  pebble,  rock,  fossil;  every  lichen,  moss,  and 
fern;  every  plant,  shrub,  and  tree;  every  flower  that  blooms  and  seed  that 
ripens ;  the  glory  and  gladness  of  dawn ;  the  silence  and  sadness  of  twi- 
light; the  day  of  Ossianic  fog  and  mist,  as  well  as  the  day  of  brightness; 
the  sparkle  of  winter  frosts  as  well  as  the  fervors  of  summer  heats;  the 
promise  of  spring  and  the  fruitions  of  autumn.  To  your  native  centers 
fast  gather  into  your  beings  all  the  flowing  forces  of  past  progress, 
remoulding  them  into  better,  higher  future  progress.  In  the  great  elec- 
tric lamp  of  the  world  be  carbon  points,  transmuting  its  spiritual  currents 
into  flame,  to  shine  down  the  vistas  of  the  future. 


264  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 


REVy,  MATHAN  UARS  HULL,  D.  D. 

Text. — "  I  have  fought  a  good  fight,  I  have  finished  my  course,  I 
have  kept  the  faith;  henceforth  there  is  laid  up  for  me  a  crown  of  right- 
eousness, which  the  Lord,  the  righteous  Judge, shall  give  me  at  that  day; 
and  not  to  me  only,  but  unto  all  them  also  that  love  his  appearing." 
2  Tim.  4:7,  8. 

This  church,  called  on  to-day  for  the  first  time  in  its  history  to  bury 
a  pastor,  we,  its  members,  meet  in  a  new,  most  touching,  and  most  test-, 
ing  service.  For  over  thirty-five  years  he  who  now  lies  peaceful  before 
us  has  been  not  only  our  pastor,  but  likewise  personal  friend,  and  brother, 
and  father,  all  in  one.  He  has  gone  out  and  in  before  us  as  our  under- 
shepherd,  leading  us  by  the  still  waters  of  peace  and  prosperity.  He 
has  in  times  of  affliction,  oh,  how  often,  been  the  divinely-appointed 
means  of  restoring  our  souls  with  heavenly  consolations,  ever  leading  in 
the  paths  of  righteousness,  and  how  many,  as  they  walked  through  the 
valley  and  shadow  of  death,  has  he  enabled  to  fear  no  evil,  by  helping 
them  to  firmly  grasp  the  divine  rod  and  staff  that  comforteth  and  sup- 
porteth,  and  to  look  to  the  heavenly  hills,  whence  cometh  help!  We  all 
had  learned  to  repose  in  him  as  a  tower  of  strength,  as  a  wise  counselor, 
a  safe  guide,  a  friend  ever  to  be  relied  on.  We  have  seen,  lo,  these  many 
years,  not  only  the  members  of  this  church,  but  a  great  cloud  of  wit- 
nesses, as  well,  in  all  the  regions  round  about,  how  bravely,  how  valiantly, 
how  sacrificially,  and  how  well  he  has  fought  the  good  fight  to  the  very 
end,  and  our  tears  of  sorrow  are  illumed  by  the  joyful  assurance  that  to 
him  has  been  given  the  crown  of  righteousness! 

What  is  thus  to  you  all  an  epochal  day  in  your  lives  becomes  to  me 
personally  the  most  trying  one  in  my  experience  save  the  one,  perhaps, 
when  I  was  called  to  perform  a  like  service  for  the  late  President  Kenyon. 
Taken  at  once  into  his  confidence  when  he  became  pastor  of  this  church, 
he  has  ever  been  to  me  an  elder  brother.  Coming  to  me  in  all  times  of 
joy,  consulting  freely  on  textual  interpretation  and  doctrinal  points, 
rejoicing  together  over  many  a  new  book  of  value,  thus  closely  bound 
together  in  all  the  joys  and  sorrows  and  labors  of  life,  when  he  made 
known  this,  his  last  wish,  it  seemed  impossible  to  fulfill  it;  but  remember- 
ing that,  having  performed  the  like  service  for  the  companion  of  his  youth, 
and  having  officiated  at  that  fortunate  and  blessed  marriage  altar  whereby 
he  was  united  to  her  who  now  here  weeps  a  widow,  and  remembering 
that  it  was  the  last  service  I  could  perform  for  him,  I  tremblingly  replied, 
"  I  will  try;"  and  now  I  beseech  your  sympathies  and  your  prayers. 


SERMONS.  265 

On  thus  consenting,  I  inquired  if  he  had  any  memoranda  of  his  life 
and  labors  that  might  be  used.  He  repHed,  "Not  a  scrap."  His  aim 
through  life  had  been  to  go  forward  in  whatever  duty  came  to  him, 
uncaring  for  his  name  in  the  future. 

I  have  gathered  from  other  sources  the  following  brief  data:  He  was 
born  October  18,  1808,  in  the  town  of  Berlin,  Rensselaer  County;  1814, 
moved  with  his  parents  to  this  town;  1829  became  a  member  of  this  church, 
in  the  twenty-first  year  of  his  age;  November,  1830,  preached  his  first 
sermon;  I  have  not  been  able  to  learn  the  time  of  his  ordination;  July  7, 
1830,  was  married  to  Miss  Phalla  Vincent,  of  Almond;  1833-1846,  he 
was  pastor  of  the  Clarence  church,  Erie  County,  thirteen  years;  May  i, 
1846,  he  became  pastor  of  this  church;  1848- 1 862,  president  of  the  trust- 
ees of  Alfred  Academy  and  University,  thenceforward  vice  president; 
1858-1877,  president  of  the  Education  Society;  1868,  appointed  professor 
of  pastoral  theology  in  the  Theological  Department  of  Alfred  University; 
1872,  appointed  editor  of  the  Sabbath  Recorder,  entering  upon  the  duties 
of  the  appointment  in  June;  September  9,  1872,  he  was  married  to  Mrs. 
Lura  A.  Hartshorn;  May,  1881,  preached  his  last  sermon;  at  midday, 
September  5,  departed  this  life. 

Such  is  the  meager  outline  of  a  great  life.  Let  us,  as  best  we  may  in 
these  brief  moments,  consider  some  of  the  more  salient  points  and  char- 
acteristics of  this  life,  and  draw  lessons  of  inspiration  and  guidance  there- 
from, for  no  teaching  is  so  potent  as  great  and  noble  living. 

Our  pastor,  as  if  by  a  wise  provision,  was  endowed  with  a  physical 
constitution  eminently  fitted  for  the  arduous  labors  which,  under  Provi- 
dence, it  was  his  mission  in  life  to  perform.  He  was  a  born  athlete. 
Standing  six  feet  in  height,  symmetrically  and  strongly  built  in  every 
limb  and  fiber,  with  face  of  Grecian  type  and  sculpturing,  if  he  had  lived 
in  the  days  of  Paul,  he  could  have  easily  become  a  winner  in  those 
athletic  exercises,  or  endured  the  hardnesses  of  the  Roman  legions,  whose 
tread  shook  the  world,  from  both  of  which  the  apostle  was  wont  to  draw 
such  frequent  illustrations  and  ensamples,  our  text  among  the  number, 
for  the  Christian  athlete  and  soldier.  .  .  .  Work  was  his  joy,  his  life. 
He  said  to  mc  a  few  days  ago:  "  It  seems  to  me  I  have  done  the  work  of 
three  to  five  men  all  these  years.  I  have  carried  to  the  uttermost  pound 
of  my  strength  of  the  world's  burdens.  I  have  not  knowingly  shirked  a 
single  ounce.  I  have  not  known  for  these  many  years  what  it  is  to  be 
rested  of  the  weariness  that  overwork  brings."  It  was  this  unremitted 
overstrain  that  shortened  his  days,  lengthened  as  they  were,  for  with  his 
physique  there  was  no  natural  reason  why  he  might  not  have  lived  on 
yet  several  3^ears. 


266  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

Our  pastor  was  likewise  a  mental  athlete,  strong,- agile,  ever  alert, 
quick  to  see,  grasp,  appropriate,  and  express  a  new  truth,  a  prime  gift  for 
the  preacher,  in  the  requirements  enumerated  by  Paul,  and  which  our 
pastor  gave  early  proof  of  as  a  common-school  teacher,  bringing,  accord- 
ing to  the  testimony  of  his  pupils,  order  out  of  chaos,  and  lighting  up 
the  whole  school  with  a  new  and  great  enthusiasm  for  learning.  As  a 
dialectician  he  was  adroit,  supple,  ingenious,  quick  to  parry,  prompt  to 
attack,  watchful  of  opportunity,  being  thus  well  fitted  to  become,  as  he 
did,  not  only  a  sleepless  watchman  on  the  walls  of  Zion,  but  likewise 
the  chosen  champion  of  the  denominational  faith  and  practice. 

With  a  will,  indomitable,  masterful,  self-reliant,  giving  power  to  stand 
squarely  on  both  feet,  and  the  ambidexter  use  of  all  his  faculties,  he  was 
fitted  to  become  a  dominant  power  among  men,  a  leader  among  leaders, 
a  prince  in  Israel,  whose  regnancy  had  the  express  approval  of  nature's 
divine  signature  and  seal.' 

Added  to  these  attributes  of  strength  and  power,  he  possessed  what 
is  seldom  in  strong  natures, — a  most  delicate  sensibility,  an  emotional 
nature,  sensitively  alive  to  loveliness  in  nature  or  life.  To  "the  inquiring 
love  of  truth,"  as  Dr.  Arnold  expresses  it,  "there  went  along  a  divine 
love  of  beauty  and  goodness,"  and  gave  him  "that  considerate  sympathy 
and  refined  courtesy  which  invest  with  a  peculiar  attractiveness  a  few 
superior  natures."  Shrinking  with  all  the  high,  chaste  delicacy  and  sen- 
sitiveness of  a  woman  from  the  coarse,  the  low,  he  was  attracted  lovingly 
to  the  beautiful  and  good  everywhere.  Witness  his  lively  appreciation 
of  the  beauties  of  nature,  as  expressed  in  the  sculptured  hills  and  valleys 
of  this  region;  witness  his  sympathy  with  all  gentle,  sweet,  noble  living; 
witness  his  intense  love  of  innocent,  artless  childhood;  witness  his  tender, 
loving  treatment  and  care  of  animals;  witness  the  simple  neatness  and 
order  of  his  apparel,  his  model  home,  with  all  its  surroundings  and 
appointments;  witness  the  delicate  amenities  he  carried  into  all  the  rela- 
tions and  activities  of  life.  In  short,  he  was  a  refined  Christian  gentle- 
man, of  the  old  school,  if  you  please,  a  school  fast  disappearing  in  this 
age  of  rush  and  sharp,  incisive  activity. 

Thus  endowed  and  panoplied  by  nature,  when  lifted  by  the  divine 
life  to  a  higher  plane  of  living  and  thinking,  and  especially  when  the  call 
to  preach  came,  he  gave  himself  utterly  to  the  work.  It  was  to  him, 
from  the  very  first  and  contmually,  not  a  profession  merely,  but  a  di\  ine 
enthusiasm  and  joy, — his  life.  From  the  start,  and  always,  he  had  the 
same  assurance  of  his  divine  call  that  Christ  had  respecting  his  teachings, 
— "the  common  people  heard  him  gladly."     Commencing  his  niinistr\-  in 


SERMONS.  26/ 

an  age  when  people  believed  more  implicitly  than  now  in  a  special  divine 
call  to  preach,  it  was  no  unusual  thing  to  hear  those  who  had  listened  to 
him  remarking,  "Well,  I  guess  there  can  be  no  question  about  Jiis  being 
a  called  preacher."  "Not  a  bit  of  it,"  was  the  quick  response.  The 
approving  seal  of  a  common  Christian  consciousness  was  from  the  first 
set  upon  his  ministry. 

At  the  time  of  his  entering  upon  this  work  it  was  the  common  prac- 
tice of  preachers  through  this  region  to  divide  their  time  and  labor 
between  the  ministry  and  some  industrial  pursuit.  He  said  that  he 
resolved  at  once  to  live  by  the  gospel  alone.  Whether  with  bread  or 
without  it,  whether  he  lived  or  perished,  he  would  give  himself  entirely 
to  the  preaching  of  the  word.  He  accordingly  set  himself  at  once  to 
the  carrying  out  of  Paul's  injunction  to  Timothy:  "  Preach  the  word;  be 
instant  in  season,  out  of  season;  reprove,  rebuke,  exhort,  with  all  long- 
suffering  and  doctrine."  "Do  the  work  of  an  evangelist;  make  full  proof 
of  thy  ministry." 

Springing,  as  he  expressed  it,  from  among  the  stumps  and  log  heaps 
directly  into  the  pulpit,  without  any  preliminary  training,  with  but  a 
limited  common-school  education,  his  first  and  perpetual  aim  was,  in 
connection  with  his  ministerial  labors,  to  seek  culture,  to  seek  it  from  all 
sources,  in  conversation,  in.  intercourse  with  men,  in  travel,  in  books — 
wherever  obtainable.  Being  one  of  those  natures  that  readily  and  easily 
take  on  the  polish  of  society,  the  transforming  influence  became  quickly 
marked.  My  first  remembrance  of  him  is  of  his  appearance  in  the  pulpit 
when  he  first  began  to  preach.  Clad  in  coarse  homemade  garments, 
with  coat  off,  with  action  angular,  sharp,  intense,  as  if  chopping  his  daily 
four  cords  of  wood,  with  voice  keyed  on  the  high,  monotonous  pitch 
popular  in  those  days,  with  his  mobile  and  expressive  countenance  radiant 
with  enthusiasm  and  streaming  with  perspiration,  he  carried  the  audience 
literally  by  storm,  moving,  swa\"ing  it  as  he  listed.  After  an  absence  of 
a  few  years  he  returned,  and  I  could  scarcely  realize  that  it  was  the  same 
man.  The  polish,  the  ease,  the  grace  captivated,  held  me  enthralled. 
The  transformation  from  the  rude,  uncultured  youth  to  the  model  gen- 
tleman was  complete,  and  seemed  to  me  nothing  less  than  miraculous. 

The  mode  and  course  of  his  theological  studies  were  quite  different 
from  those  laid  down  in  the  schools,  nevertheless,  very  effective,  and  with 
many  fine  results.  He  made  the  Bible,  and  especially  the  New  Testa- 
ment portion,  the  initial  point  and  the  pervasive  element  in  this  study. 
Using  the  house  of  worship  at  Clarence  for  his  study,  he  retired  to  it 
whenever  opportunity  permitted,  and  there  memorized  verse  after  verse. 


268  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

chapter  after  chapter,  book  after  book,  of  tlie  Bible,  rehearsing  them 
aloud,  interspersing  the  exercise  with  song  and  prayer.  He  said  this 
meetinghouse  became  to  him  a  very  Bethel,  wherein  some  of  the  most 
blissful  moments  of  his  life  were  passed,  frequently  losing  all  note  of  time 
or  place,  so  rapt  became  he  in  the  entrancing  study.  As  a  result,  the 
leading  portions  of  the  Bible  became  so  a  part  of  his  mental  being  that 
seldom  or  never  was  he  at  a  loss  for  a  quotation,  making  it  instantly,  and 
without  the  necessity  of  turning  to  the  passage,  giving,  not  only  verses 
but  whole  chapters,  without  the  least  apparent  hesitancy.  Often  have  I 
had  occasion  to  note  this  facility,  not  only  in  the  pulpit,  but  in  discussions 
in  his  library,  when,  on  any  Bible  thought  or  passage  coming  up,  he 
could  immediately  give  chapter  and  verse  and  context.  This  facility 
had,  doubtless,  somewhat  waned  in  his  later  years. 

In  addition  to  this  direct  Bible  study  he  used  all  the  side  light  attain- 
able for  its  elucidation.  He  prosecuted  the  study  of  Greek  sufficiently 
to  read  the  New  Testament  in  the  original.  He  gathered  about  him  all 
the  best  commentaries,  works  on  theology,  and,  so  far  as  his  means 
would  allow,  all  the  leading  books  and  publications  of  the  day  likely  in 
any  way  to  help  him  in  his  work.  He  unremittingly  strove  to  keep  pace 
with  the  age,  well  abreast  of  the  thoughts  and  investigations  that  were 
shaping  human  progress,  and  to  this  end  sought  every  book  that  would 
h-elp  on.  His  library  is  rich  in  works  of  this  kind,  being  one  of  the  best 
libraries  for  a  minister  we  know.  He  did  not,  however,  confine  himself 
to  books  in  seeking  aids  in  his  work.  He  mingled  with  men  with  this 
object  in  view.  In  his  earlier  years  he  was  wont  to  visit  courts  of  justice 
to  study  human  nature  as  related  to  crime  and  justice,  and  especially  to 
witness  the  effect  of  argument  and  appeal  of  lawyers  upon  juries. 

On  assuming  the  pastorate  of  this  church  his  labors  became  manifold 
and  arduous.  In  addition  to  the  care  of  this  large  church,  spread  over 
a  wide  region,  he  soon  established  outh'ing  preaching  stations  in  various 
directions.  This  practice  he  has  kept  up  through  most  of  these  years. 
For  many  years  he  was  the  regular  and  favorite  preacher  to  the  students. 
From  the  first  he  took  great  interest  in  them,  and  they  in  him.  One  of 
the  severest  taxes  upon  his  time  and  strength  was  the  number  and  range 
of  the  funeral  services  he  was  called  upon  to  perform.  Being  a  favorite 
preacher  of  such  sermons  throughout  a  wide  region,  he  was  sometimes 
called  upon  to  preach  three  such  sermons  in  a  day,  frequently  two,  often 
having  to  travel  far  in  this  mission.  The  bright  side  to  this  picture  was 
that  he  was  called  equally  wide  and  far  to  officiate  at  the  marriage  altar. 

Coming  here  without  an\'  children  of  his  own,  he  at  once  took  to  his 


SERMONS.  269 

heart  all  the  children  of  his  flock,  adopting  them  as  his  own.  Being  the 
■very  embodiment  of  Christian  courtesy  and  sympathy  to  all,  his  tender- 
ness and  love  of  children  was  very  touching.  Like  a  true  and  Roving 
shepherd,  he  carried  these  lambs  of  his  flock  very  close  to  his  great  and 
loving  heart.  He  watched  over  and  prayed  for  them  with  unremitting 
solicitude,  rejoiced  in  their  welldoing,  followed  them,  and  wept  over 
them  in  their  waywardness,  often  more  anxiously  than  their  own  parents. 
Many  a  sleepless  and  tearful  night  has  he  thus  spent.  Thus  has  grown 
up  a  generation  that  had  learned  to  love  him  as  a  father.  The  active 
members  of  the  church  when  he  became  its  pastor  he  has  mostly  buried. 
He  has  baptized  most  of  the  present  active  membership. 

As  a  reformer,  his  labors  were  likewise  manifold.  In  the  early  days 
of  temperance  and  antislavery — those  days  that  tried  men — he  was  an 
acknowledged  leader,  and  frequent  were  the  calls  upon  him  for  lec- 
turing and  other  labors  in  these  fields.  His  eloquent  and  stirring  appeals 
in  behalf  of  temperance  and  liberty  had  much  to  do  in  shaping  public 
sentiment  and  moving  to  action. 

He  has  been  identified  with  all  of  the  denominational  enterprises — 
the  missionary,  the  tract,  the  publishing,  the  educational — from  their 
earliest  inception  to  the  present.  Holding  in  them  official  positions 
almost  continuously,  they  have  received  his  earnest  support,  anxious 
solicitude,  giving  freely  of  time,  labor,  and  means  for  the  advancement 
of  their  interests. 

As  editor  of  the  Sabbath  Recorder  for  the  last  nine  years,  both  his 
labors  and  the  circle  of  his  influence  have  been  greatly  augmented.  His 
pen  has  been  a  constant  and  effecti\-e  defender  and  promulgator  of  the 
denominational  faith  and  practice.  The  Sabbath,  in  special,  has  received 
his  untiring  attention.  His  discussions  connected  therewith  have  been 
marked  by  great  candor,  great  courtesy,  and  great  ability.  His  gracious 
words  of  counsel,  of  admonition,  and  of  comfort,  on  various  points  of 
experimental  religion,  have  touched  responsive  chords  in  many  a  soul. 

The  text  reads,  "And  not  to  me  only,  but  unto  all  them  also  that  love 
his  appearing."  This  was  the  great  object  for  which  Paul  had  made  his 
good  fight.  It  was  not  simply  or  chiefly  for  his  own  personal  salvation 
and  crown  of  righteousness,  but  for  that  of  others,  he  had  sacrificially 
lived  and  fought.  Such  also  was  the  good  fight  made  by  our  pastor. 
His  warfare  was  a  sacrificial  one.  His  life  was  a  libation,  poured  freely, 
even  joyfully  for  others.  That  others  may  be  crowned  with  the  crown  of 
righteousness  was  the  one  great  end  of  all  his  labors.  As  a  good  under 
shepherd,  his  life  was  motived  and  inspired  by  the  Great  Shepherd,  ready 
to  lay  down  his  life  for  the  good  of  the  sheep. 


2/0  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

"I  have  kept  the  faith."  This  was  the  great  motive  power.  Knowl- 
edge is  power,  but  faith  is  a  greater  power.  It  Hfts  above  all  earthly 
influences  and  forces,  above  all  fitful  gust  or  sweeping  storm,  to  the  calm 
regions  where  sweep  with  an  even,  perpetual  flow  the  balmy  breezes  of 
God.  His  was  a  living  faith  in  Christ  as  his  personal  Saviour,  and  in  God 
as  his  reconciled  Father.  This  living  faith  was  the  motive,  the  power, 
not  of  the  earth,  earthy,  but  of  heaven,  and  supernatural — a  living,  divine 
energy,  a  vital  force  shaping  his  daily  life  as  well  as  his  public  ministra- 
tions. The  word  of  God  was  the  wellspring  of  life,  whence  he  drank 
perpetual  drafts.  It  gave  rule  and  guidance  to  his  faith.  He  loved  with 
an  undivided 'heart  its  teachings,  its  commands,  its  doctrines.  Whatever 
his  infirmities,  none  saw  them  more  clearly,  lamented  them  more  sin- 
cerely, or  prayed  over  them  more  earnestly,  than  himself.  And  he  "  grew 
in  grace  and  the  further  knowledge  of  the  truth"  to  the  very  end.  His 
life  grew  more  winning,  beneficent,  and  tender  in  its  personal  expression, 
more  rich,  instructive,  and  gracious  in  its  public  ministrations,  to  the  end. 
The  halo  of  a  serene  and  benignant  old  age  crowned  him.  He  had 
become,  indeed,  a  father  in  Israel,  whose  words,  by  voice  and  pen,  were 
reverently  waited  for. 

Yes,  he  has  fought  a  good  fight — good  because  fought,  not  for  self- 
seeking  or  worldly,  but  for  unselfish  and  divine,  ends;  good  because 
fought,  not  with  carnal,  but  with  spiritual  weapons;  good  because  fought, 
not  for  earthly,  but  for  heavenly,  righteous  crowns.  But  this  good  fight, 
thus  bravely,  unselfishly,  righteously  fought,  is  all  at  an  end  now,  and  the 
good  soldier,  "  ready  to  be  offered,"  has  been  called  up  higher,  to  an 
exceeding  great  reward.  The  long  pastorate  has  been  closed,  not  by 
action  of  pastor  or  people,  but  by  the  Great  Shepherd,  who  has  bidden 
his  faithful  4.mder  shepherd  to  higher  and  diviner  fields  of  usefulness  and 
blessedness. 

In  passing  he  has  let  fall  his  armor  of  God,  his  spiritual  weapons, — 
the  mantle  of  charity,  the  helmet'of  salvation,  the  red  cross  shield,  the 
breastplate  of  righteousness,  the  girdle  of  truth,  the  sword  of  the  Spirit, 
the  sandals  of  the  gospel  of  peace.  Gather  ye  up  these,  reverently, 
lovingly,  one  by  one,  and  panoply  therewith  him  whom  you  may  choose 
as  his  successor,  praying  that  a  double  portion  of  his  spirit  may  be  both 
upon  him  and  upon  us  all.  And  now  may  the  benedictions  of  the  All- 
compassionate  Father  descend  and  rest  evermore  upon  the  widowed  one, 
upon  all  stricken  relatives,  upon  this  church  and  people,  and  upon  all 
whom  this  bereavement  shall  reach.     Amen. 


SERMONS.  271 


PRESIDENT    dAMES  ABRAM   GARFIELD. 

[A  sermon  delivered  at  the  church,  before  the  citizens  and  students  of  Alfred, 
Monday,  September  26,  1881,  in  accordance  with  the  proclamations  of  the 
President  and  of  the  Governor.  ] 

Text. — "  It  is  expedient  for  us,  that  one  should  die  for  the  people,  and 
that  the  whole  nation  perish  not."     John  1 1  :  50. 

When  called  upon  some  sixteen  years  and  five  months  ago  to  give  a 
like  sermon  to  the  memory  of  the  martyr  President  Lincoln,  I  could  find 
no  text  so  fitting  as  this  text,  and  now,  after  beating  about  among  all  the 
Bible  boughs  for  fruitage  suitable  for  this  occasion,  none  falls  to  my  hand 
so  fit  as  this  same  text,  and  I  am  therefore  constrained  to  use  it  for  our 
second  martyr  President.  It  seems,  indeed,  most  appropriate  that  our 
two  Presidents,  united  in  their  lives  by  a  common  service  of  country, 
struck  down  by  not  unlike  bad  forces,  undivided  in  their  deaths,  a  two- 
fold offering  for  the  nation's  salvation,  should  be  commemorated  with 
unison  of  service.  Lincoln  poured  his  blood,  a  libation  to  human  liberty, 
an  atonement  for  human  slavery;  Garfield  poured  his  blood,  a  libation  to 
political  purity,  an  atonement  for  political  corruption.     .     .     . 

No  salvation  can  come  without  suffering,  no  atonement  without  blood. 
This  law  is  universal  and  unalterable.  Humanity  could  have  no  spiritual 
redemption  save  as  the  Divine  became  flesh,  taking  all  the  limitations, 
liabilities,  temptations,  and  sufferings  of  the  human,  and  ultimately  death. 
Only  thus  could  the  human  be  lifted  out  of  sin,  regenerated,  and  be  made 
to  live  again.  Jesus  could  be  Saviour  only  by  his  blood-shedding.  All 
love  in  its  beneficence  must  be  a  sacrifice.  All  salvation,  whether  spirit- 
ual, national,  social,  or  physical,  is  effected  through  suffering  and  dying. 
Jesus  becomes  thus  in  his  life  of  love  and  sacrificial  death  the  type  and 
ensample  of  all  lives  of  love,  labors  of  good  will,  and  sacrificial  service 
for  human  weal.  All  benefactors,  all  leaders,  all  elevators  of  humanity 
must  pattern  themselves  after  their  divine  prototype.  Humanity  has 
never  taken  a  step  forward  and  upward  without  that  step  dripping  with 
blood.  Every  truth  coming  from  God  to  man  has  been  received  with 
mocks  and  scoffs,  and  its  evangels  baptized  in  blood.  The  divinest  lives 
have  ever  been  crowned  with  thorns,  their  brows  ever  damp  and  dripping 
with  blood.  Jesus  and  the  cross,  Socrates  and  the  poisoned  cup,  Stephen 
and  stones,  Paul  and  bonds  and  imprisonment,  James  and  the  block, 
Savonarola  and  the  scaftbld,  Galileo  and  the  dungeon,  Joan  of  Arc  and 
the  fagot,  Puritans  and  persecution,  Lincoln  and  Garfield  and  the  bullet, 
are  all  types  of  the  devotements  of  religion,  the  consecrations  of  philan- 


272  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

thropy,  the  offerings  of  patriotism,  the  fidehties  to  truth.  The  illustrious 
lives  of  witnesses,  confessors,  martyrs,  have  ever  found  Cah^ary  their 
type.  The  world's  worthies,  of  whom  itself  has  ever  been  unworthy, 
have  had  for  their  lot,  as  Paul  puts  it,  to  be  mocked,  and  scourged,  and 
stoned,  and  sawn  asunder,  slain  with  the  sword,  to  wander  about  clad  in 
sheepskins  and  goatskins,  in  deserts  and  mountains,  being  destitute, 
afflicted,  tormented.  Religious  liberty,  one  of  the  most  potent  mfluences, 
the  highest  aspiration  of  the  human  soul,  has  been  attained  at  the  sacri- 
fice, it  is  estimated,  of  three  hundred  million  lives.  Civil  liberty,  the  child 
of  religious  liberty,  has  had,  like  its  illustrious  sire,  a  gory  history.  Like 
all  other  noble  sentiments  having  for  their  end  the  uplifting  of  humanity, 
it  has  had  to  pass  through  a  Red  Sea  of  blood,  and  wander  long  in  the 
desert,  preparatory  to  its  conquest  of  the  promised  land,  and  its  possession 
of  the  thrones  of  the  world.  The  cry  of  the  people  under  oppression 
has  come  down  through  the  ages  as  the  perpetual  wail  of  an  east  wind. 
Indeed,  the  world's  sacrificial  altar  fires  have  ever  been  reeky  with  the 
blood  and  smoke  of  its  multitudinous  victims,  darkening  the  heavens, 
and  beating  up  before  the  mercy  seat  with  perpetual  gloom  and  sadness. 
And  now  this  new  offering,  in  the  language  of  Garfield  himself,  respect- 
ing Lincoln,  has  for  the  moment  withdrawn  the  thin  veil  which  separates 
us  from  the  eternities,  and  the  whisperings  of  the  ever  compassionate 
Father  to  his  children,  comforting  them  in  their  sorrows,  can  be  clearly 
heard. 

These  lives  thus  sacrificially  offered  have  left  the  richest  legacy 
humanity  knows.  Lives  are  the  great  helps  to  other  lives.  They  awaken 
sentiment,  affection,  action.  Great  lives  are  the  masterful  forces  in  prog- 
ress and  civilization.  Humanity  cries  out  passionately  for  noble,  inspi- 
rational lives,  wherein  all  high  and  holy  principles  and  forces  are  inwrought 
into  character.  It  is  famishing  for  lives  clean,  healthy,  and  wholesome. 
It  needs  the  inspiration  of  lives  that  attract  to  nobleness,  full  of  aspiration 
and  high  endeavor,  supported  by  achievement.  It  calls  for  lives  lived 
upon  the  clear  heights  of  sincerity,  open-eyed,  calm-browed,  awakening 
in  others  the  impulse  to  seek  a  like  nobleness,  and  inducing  them  to 
marshal  all  their  powers  in  subduing  all  bad  influences  and  converting  all 
evil  as  well  as  all  good  into  triumphs.  The  world  needs  lives  illumined 
by  truth,  attuned  to  sweetest  sympathy,  full  of  spiritual  vigor,  rich  in 
culture;  lives  that  have  faith  in  great  principles,  and  live  according  to 
this  faith.  The  legacy  of  just  such  lives  the  world  has  in  this  innumer- 
able throng  who  have  lived  and  died  sacrificially.  Incalculably  great  is 
their  power  for  instructing,  inspiring,  guiding  us,  if  we  can  but  have  our 
spiritual  vision  open  and  our  spiritual  hearing  attuned  to  receive. 


SERMONS.  2/3 

The  life,  achievement,  and  character  of  our  martyr  President  is  pre- 
eminently one  of  those  specially  fitted  for  just  such  service.  His  life, 
almost  flawless,  stands  a  model,  great,  noble,  symmetrical,  harmonious. 
What  Apollo  Belvidere  is  among  Greek  sculpture,  he  is  among  states- 
men. His  is  a  life  all  can  study  with  profit,  especially  all  youth  who 
aspire  to  excellency  in  character  or  greatness  in  achievement. 

Let  us  then  note  and  ponder  some  of  the  more  salient  points  of  his 
life. 

Notice  the  following  rungs  of  the  ladder  by  which  he  has  climbed: 
Born  in  poverty  and  in  the  wilderness;  left  fatherless  before  two  years  of 
age;  thence,  till  eighteen,  living,  growing,  and  working  as  poor  boys 
must,  turning  his  hand  to  whatever  he  could  find  to  do  on  the  little  farm, 
and,  in  addition,  wood  chopper,  carpentering,  canal  boat  boy;  awakened 
to  an  intellectual  life  at  eighteen,  he  became  an  academic  student,  working 
his  way  by  his  trade  and  common-school  teaching;  born  into  the  spiritual 
life  at  nineteen,  he  soon  after  resolved  to  obtain  a  collegiate  education, 
becoming  an  assistant  academic  teacher  and  a  preacher;  twenty-three,  a 
collegian,  junior  class;  twenty-five,  a  college  graduate  and  a  professor  of 
ancient  languages  and  literature;  twenty-six,  married,  and  an  academic 
principal,  a  teacher,  lecturer,  political  speaker,  law  student,  and  preacher; 
twenty-nine,  in  addition  to  the  above,  State  senator;  thirty-one,  entered 
the  army  as  colonel,  and,  in  consequence  of  heroic  daring  in  his  first  bat- 
tle, promoted  by  the  War  Department  to  the  rank  of  brigadier  general; 
thirty -two,  for  meritorious  services  in  the  second  important  battle  in  which 
he  was  engaged,  promoted  to  the  rank  of  major  general;  thirty-three  to 
forty-eight,  member  of  the  lower  House  of  Congress  ;  forty-eight,  elected 
a  senator  and  President  of  the  United  States  ;  forty-nine,  March  4,  became 
President,  resigning  his  seat  in  both  branches  of  Congress  to  clear  the 
way;  September  19,  received  a  martyr's  crown. 

Let  us  note  next  some  of  the  forces  and  conditions  both  within  and 
around  him  that  were  operative  in  this  wonderfully  versatile,  onward 
marching,  and  ever  ascending  career. 

I.  TJic  Mother.— Uxs  first  and  best  gift  was  his  "little  mother,"  as  he 
was  wont  affectionately  to  call  her.  She  was  of  the  heroic  order.  What- 
ever noble  and  heroic  appears  in  his  struggles  and  triumphs,  to  me  the 
same  appears  supremely  more  so  in  the  mother.  The  mother  was  the 
root  and  nourisher  of  all  that  was  bravest  and  best  in  the  son.  Yes,  noble 
mothers  are  among  the  divinest  gifts  of  God,  and,  young  men  and  women, 
be  devoutly  thankful  to  him  for  such — you  that  have  them.  Gathering 
the  robes  of  her  widowhood  and  sorrow  about  her,  and  her  children  in 


18 


2  74  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

her  arms,  she  said,  "  I  will  try  to  be  brave  for  your  sweet  sakes" — a  resolu- 
tion she  kept  heroically  through  all  the  years  wherein  they  required  her 
aid.  The  last  words  of  her  husband  had  been:  "I  am  going  to  leave  you, 
Eliza.  I  have  planted  four  saplings  in  the  woods,  and  I  must  leave  ^hem 
to  your  care."  Faithfully  and  well  did  she  fulfill  the  trust.  With  a  small, 
poor  farm,  incumbered  with  debt,  in  a  dense  forest  only  partially  broken 
by  clearings,  she  assumed  her  task.  In  addition  to  her  household  cares, 
she  went  to  the  fields  with  the  boys,  chopping,  building  fences,  planting, 
hoeing,  harvesting,  leading  in  all  the  rugged  work  of  the  farm.  As  a 
necessary  result,  comparative  prosperity  followed.  James  became  her 
special  care  and  burden.  Restless,  desiring  an  adventurous  life  of  sailor 
or  soldier,  caring  comparatively  little  for  books,  she  bent  all  her  energies 
to  curb  and  change  these  proclivities,  and  lead  them  up  to  religion  and 
learning.  "  Remember  your  God,  and  study  books,"  was  the  request, 
earnestly  pressed  upon  him,  the  earnest  prayer  for  him.  To  this  end 
she  sent  him  early  to  school,  his  elder  sister  carrying  him  back  and  forth 
on  her  back,  through  the  mud  and  snow.  At  school  he  met  with  the 
fate  common  to  poor,  defenseless  boys,  owing  to  the  universal  depravity 
of  boy  nature.  The  stronger  boys  began  at  once  to  abuse  and  knock 
him  about.  His  fiery  soul  flames  at  the  insult,  and,  regardless  of  size,  he 
thrashes  everyone  presuming  to  abuse  him.  He  is  soon  recognized  as 
the  "fighting  boy"  that  is  well  to  let  alone.  When  sufficiently  grown, 
his  restless  spirit,  in  spite  of  his  mother's  entreaties,  led  him  to  the  lake, 
to  ship  as  a  sailor,  from  which  he  was  driven  by  abuse,  then  to  the  canal, 
where  he  was  a  good  fighter  as  well  as  worker,  from  which  he  was  driven 
home  by  the  ague.  As  he  approached  the  house,  he  saw  through  the  open 
window  his  mother  kneeling,  with  the  open  Bible  before  her,  and  heard 
her  praying:  "Oh,  turn  unto  me,  and  have  mercy  upon  me!  Give  thy 
strength  unto  thy  servant,  and  save  the  son  of  thy  handmaid."  He  real- 
ized that  his  course  was  crushing  her,  and,  with  arm  about  her  neck,  he 
gave  assurance  of  nobler  aims,  which,  during  the  long  ague  sickness  that 
followed,  through  the  instrumentality  of  the  mother,  assisted  by  the 
teacher  in  the  district,  ripened  into  a  genuine  intellectual  awakening. 
Henceforward  all  went  well.  No  wonder,  then,  that  the  son  should  ever 
after  manifest  such  filial  devotion,  and  give  such  gentle  and  glad  service 
to  the  "little  mother." 

2.  The  Wife. — Equally  fortunate  was  he  in  his  wife.  A  woman  of 
perfect  self-poise,  unswerving  rectitude,  gentle,  patient,  unobtrusive,  intel- 
lectual, keen,  cultured,  conscientiously  devoted  to  everything  good,  she 
has  ever  moved  on  in  the  tranquil  tenor  of  her  unobtrusive  way,  in  a  life 


SERMONS.  275 

of  complete  devotion  to  dut}',  never  forgetting  the  demands  of  her  posi- 
tion. He  once  said:  "  I  have  been  wonderfully  blessed  in  the  discretion  of 
my  wife.  She  is  one  of  the  coolest  and  best-balanced  women  I  ever  saw. 
She  is  unstampedable."  She  was  a  woman  eminently  fitted  to  a  man  of 
Garfield's  nature,  and  much  of  his  success  in  life  may  well  be  attributed 
to  his  fortunate  marriage.  His  wife  has  grown  with  his  growth,  and  has 
been,  during  all  these  years,  the  appreciative  and  helpful  companion  in 
his  studies,  a  strong  support,  wise  counselor,  and  genuine  aid,  in  all  his 
purposes  and  efforts. 

3.  Poverty. — Garfield  said:  "Poverty  is  uncomfortable,  as  lean  testify; 
but  nine  times  out  often  the  best  thing  that  can  happen  to  a  young  man 
is  to  be  tossed  overboard,  and  compelled  to  sink  or  swim  for  himself" 
"It  is  generally  the  poor  and  obscure  little  fellow,  who  has  to  scratch  for 
every  inch,  that  will  run  ahead  and  come  to  the  front."  These  compul- 
sions of  poverty,  stimulating  his  vigorous  natural  forces,  gave  that  tact 
and  pluck,  that  grip  and  push,  which  assured  success  in  whatever  he  put 
hand  to.  While  it  compacted  and  toughened  all  forceful  attributes,  it,  at 
the  same  time,  broadened  his  sympathies,  made  gentler  and  tenderer  and 
more  beneficent  all  his  relations  and  influences.  It  seems  to  ever  be 
God's  plan,  when  he  desires  to  send  a  great  benefactor  or  conspicuous 
example  of  manhood  to  the  world,  to  pass  by  all  who  have  been  volatil- 
ized by  the  frippery  of  fashion,  enervated  by  the  luxury  of  riches,  up  to 
the  poor,  plain,  common  people,  whose  instincts  and  spontaneities  are 
much  nearer  in  harmony  with  the  Divine,  and  the  windows  of  whose  souls 
open  more  directly  heavenward.  His  especial  evangels  to  humanity  have 
been  taken  largely  from  the  poor:  Jesus  from  the  manger  and  the  stone 
mason's  trade,  Moses  from  the  bullrushes,  David  from  among  the  sheep, 
Elijah  from  among  the  cattle,  Elisha  from  the  plow,  the  apostles  from 
their  nets,  Socrates  from  statuary  cutting,  Luther  from  among  the  ore 
diggers,  Stephenson  from  the  coal  mines,  Gary  from  the  shoemaker's 
bench,  Lincoln  from  the  flatboat,  Garfield  from  the  towpath. 

4.  Masterful  Personal  Powers. — These  exterior  helps  were  responded 
to  by  masterful  personal  attributes.  Standing  six  feet  two,  weight  some 
two  hundred  and  twenty,  large-headed,  broad-shouldered,  full-chested, 
strongly  knit,  suggesting  in  his  completeness  a  modern  Samson,  with  an 
indomitable  will,  with  intellect  of  broad  sweep  and  grasp,  nature  set  her 
impress  upon  him  as  a  masterful  and  achieving  one.  From  the  very  start 
in  his  upward  career  he  verified  his  credentials.  Beginning  his  second 
term  of  school  with  a  sixpence  in  his  pocket,  he  cast  that  into  the  first 
contribution  box  that  was  presented,  and,  by  living  on  from  thirty-one  to 


276  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT     ALLEN. 

fifty  cents  worth  of  food  a  week,  and  by  sawing,  planing,  driving  nails, 
doing  whatever  turned  up,  he  was  enabled  at  the  end  of  the  term  to 
return  home  with  three  dollars  in  his  pocket.  When  he  had  fully  deter- 
mined to  seek  a  college  education,  he  excluded  all  extraneous  matters, 
read  nothing  but  what  was  helpful  in  his  studies,  and,  by  concentrating 
all  his  energies  on  the  business  in  hand,  he  was  enabled  to  complete  in 
three  years  six  of  the  eight  years  required  for  the  preparatory  and  collegi- 
ate courses,  and  at  the  same  time,  by  sweeping  halls  and  rooms,  building 
fires,  ringing  bells,  teaching,  and  carpentering,  was  enabled  not  only  to 
pay  his  way,  but  to  start  for  college  with  three  hundred  dollars  of  his  own 
earnmg  in  his  pocket. 

It  is  one  of  his  sayings  that  "a  pound  of  pluck  is  worth  a  ton  of 
luck."  He  finely  illustrated  it  in  his  first  campaign  in  the  war.  Before 
he  had  ever  seen  a  gun  fired  in  action,  he  was  placed  in  command  of  a 
detachment  of  untried  soldiers,  and  ordered  to  drive  back  a  larger  force 
of  the  enemy,  under  the  command  of  one  of  the  ablest  officers  of  that 
region.  This  he  successfully  accomplished.  A  new  danger  then  threat- 
ened his  little  force.  The  floods  came  down,  making  the  river  unnaviga- 
ble,  and  starvation  stared  them  in  the  face.  In  this  emergency,  after  try- 
ing in  vain  to  induce  the  captain  of  the  quartermaster's  steamer  to  ascend 
the  river  to  the  relief  of  his  men,  he  ordered  the  captain  and  crew  on 
board,  and,  stationing  an  army  officer  on  deck  to  see  that  they  did  their 
duty,  he  took  the  wheel  himself,  and,  struggling  against  the  current  some  ' 
forty-eight  hours,  only  eight  of  which  he  was  absent  from  the  wheel,  he 
reached  and  relieved  his  men.  A  like  exhibition  of  pluck  occurred  on 
his  second  nomination  to  Congress.  He  strongly  sympathized  with  the 
radical  movement  under  the  lead  of  Wade  against  the  President's  policy 
respecting  some  of  the  seceding  States.  The  nominating  convention 
sympathized  with  the  President,  and  the  feeling  against  Garfield  was  very 
pronounced.  When  called  upon  by  the  convention  to  explain  his  course, 
he  went  upon  the  platform,  everyone  expecting  something  in  the  nature 
of  an  apology;  but  he  boldly  approved  the  radical  manifesto  of  the  radi- 
cals, defended  his  course,  and  said  that  he  had  nothing  to  retract,  and 
could  not  change  his  honest  convictions  for  the  sake  of  a  seat  in  Con- 
gress. He  had  great  respect,  he  said,  for  the  opinions  of  his  constituents, 
but  a  greater  regard  for  his  own.  If  he  could  serve  as  an  independent 
representative,  acting  on  his  own  judgment  and  conscience,  he  would  be 
glad  to  do  so;  but  if  not,  he  did  not  want  their  nomination.  He  would 
prefer  to  be  an  independent  private  citizen.  Probably  no  man  ever  talked 
in  such  a  style,  before  or  since,  to  a  body  of  men  holding  his  political 


SERMONS.  277 

fate  in  their  hands.  Leaving  the  platform,  he  strode  away.  Scarcely  had 
he  disappeared  when  one  of  the  youngest  delegates  sprang  to  his  feet, 
saying:  "The  man  who  has  courage  to  face  a  convention  like  that  deserves 
a  nomination.  I  move  that  General  Garfield  be  nominated  by  acclama- 
tion."    The  motion  was  carried  with  a  shout. 

He  was 'born  with  a  nature  chivalric  and  daring.  One  of  his  first 
recorded  requests  is:  "Mother,  read  to  me  about  that  great  soldier. 
When  I  get  to  be  a  man,  I  am  going  to  be  a  soldier,  and  whip  people,  as 
Napoleon  did."  This  spirit  gave  him  his  longing  to  be  a  sailor,  and  com- 
mand a  ship.  A  little  over  a  year  ago  he  said:  "At  times  this  old  feeling 
comes  back  to  me.  The  sight  of  a  ship  fills  me  with  a  strong  fascina- 
tion." "I  tell  you,"  he  exclaimed,  with  flashing  eye,  "I  would  rather 
now  command  a  fleet  in  a  great  naval  battle  than  do  anything  else  on 
this  earth."  It  was  this  spirit  that  pounded  his  little  playfellows  at 
school  into  good  behavior,  that  conquered  a  peace  on  the  towpath  and 
canal  boat;  that  thrashed  a  rebellious  school  into  perfect  submission; 
that  made  him,  for  the  short  time  he  served,  one  of  the  most  daring  and 
successful  generals  of  the  war.  It  was  this  chivalric  spirit  that  gave  him 
the  finest,  though  bloodless,  victory  that  came  to  him  in  the  war.  When 
on  his  way  from  the  army  to  Congress,  he  attempted  to  go  aboard  a 
Kentucky  steamer  with  his  negro  body  servant,  but  w^as  met  by  the 
sheriff  with  a  strong  force,  who,  armed  with  the  authority  of  the  State 
law,  attempted  to  seize  the  negro  as  a  slave.  At  this  Garfield  sprang 
between,  and,  shaking  his  fist  in  their  faces,  rushed  them  off  the  boat. 
The  sheriff,  from  the  shore,  ordered  the  captain  not  to  move  the  boat 
with  negroes  aboard.  Garfield  notified  the  captain  that  he  would 
pilot  the  boat,  and  the  soldiers  run  the  engine,  and  relieve  him  of  all 
responsibility. 

He  carried  the  same  masterful  power  mto  Congress.  Continuing  the 
same  untiring  and  thorough  study  manifested  while  a  student  and 
teacher,  he  mastered  every  subject  which  he  was  called  upon  to  consider. 
He  began,  at  once,  a  long  and  assiduous  investigation  of  the  leading  sub- 
jects of  legislation,  ransacking  the  congressional  library  for  works  that 
threw  light  on  the  experience  of  other  countries,  or  gave  the  ideas  of  the 
thinkers  and  statesmen  of  all  nations  on  these  subjects.  For  his  hours  of 
recreation,  he  would  gather  about  him  all  the  rare  editions  of  some 
favorite  author,  classical  or  other,  and  leisurely  examine  their  variations 
and  critical  points.  This  wide  and  thorough  investigation  gave  his 
views  great  weight,  and  he  soon  rose  to  a  commanding  influence  in 
Congress.      .     .     . 


2/8  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

5.  The  Fruitage. — The  outcome  and  fruitage  of  such  Hving  and  doing 
was  a  man  of  rare  and  versatile  attainments  and  power.  A  commanding 
and  handsome  person,  with  winning  ways,  sympathetic  impulses,  and  mag- 
netic influence,  unique  in  varied  and  brilliant  qualities,  he -was  a  masterful 
man.  Wherever  he  came  he  conquered.  In  many  and  varied  depart- 
ments of  thought  and  action,  his  right  royal  gifts  and  culture  became 
recognized  and  distinguished. 

Next  to  John  Ouincy  Adams,  he  was  the  most  scholarly  man  that 
has  come  to  the  presidency.  He  excelled  in  the  patient  accumulation  and 
striking  generalization  of  facts.  He  roamed  in  every  field  of  intellectual 
activity,  delighted  in  poetry,  enjoyed  philosophic  thought  and  investiga- 
tion, felt  a  keen  interest  in  scientific  truth  and  research,  gleaned  eagerly 
through  the  fields  of  politics  and  history,  and  illumined  them  all  by  his 
glowing  originality.  The  records  of  the  congressional  library  show  that, 
excepting  Charles  Sumner,  he  used  more  books  than  any  other  congress- 
man. Indeed,  it  came  to  be  understood,  when  a  rare  book  was  drawn 
from  the  library,  if  Sumner  did  not  have  it,  Garfield  did. 

As  a  speaker,  he  had  no  peer  in  the  present  realm  of  statesmanship. 
Lofty  ideas  and  vigorous  logic  permeated  his  matchless  eloquence,  whose 
chaste  beauty  and  tender  grace  became  the  unstudied  manner  of  his 
speech.  Whether  in  the  pulpit,  on  the  stump,  in  the  lecture  room,  or  in 
the  halls  of  Congress,  his  polished  diction  charmed,  his  lucid  argument 
convinced,  the  pictorial  splendors  of  his  imagination  entranced,  and  the 
fused  thought  and  feeling  of  his  eloquence  captivated  and  carried  his 
hearers  wherever  he  \villed  to  lead. 

As  a  statesman,  his  aims  were  always  noble  and  lofty,  ever  serving 
his  country  with  conspicuous  ability  and  with  unselfish  ends.  He  has 
striven  to  make  the  public  service  clean  and  honorable.  He  has 
sought  to  ennoble  and  dignify  the  republic,  by  making  the  government 
one  of  statesmen  and  patriots,  not  of  demagogues  and  place-men.  He 
never  owned  nor  help  run  a  political  machine.  His  ability,  knowledge, 
mastery  of  public  questions,  generosity  of  nature,  honesty  of  purpose, 
devotion  to  the  welfare  of  the  republic,  have  done  the  work.  He  lived 
and  spoke  and  wrought  for  freedom,  and  honor,  and  faith,  and  lo\'e. 

Garfield  as  scholar,  teacher,  preacher,  soldier,  statesman,  was  unique 
in  the  combination  of  those  qualities  which  go  to  make  a  career  that 
appeals  to  all  that  is  noblest  and  best  in  our  manhood.  To  all  who 
admire  energy  and  pluck,  who  appreciate  great  abilities  and  respect  dis- 
tinguished services,  his  career  is  a  joy  and  an  inspiration.     .     .     . 

Both  Lincoln  and  Garfield  sprang  from  humble  parentage.     Lincoln's 


SERMONS.  279 

had  the  hereditary  unthrift  and  want  of  push  characteristic  of  the  South- 
ern poor;  Garfield's  had  the  hereditary  pluck  and  push  characteristic  of 
the  New  England  Puritans.     Lincoln  was  pressed  more  tightly  by  the 
iron  grip  of  poverty,  with  fewer  openings  for  escape,  or  the  ingress  of 
opportunity.     To  Lincoln  the  schools  of  Southern  Illinois,  few  and  poor, 
presented  but  scanty  means  for  education,  and  six  months  of  schooling 
in    such   was    his    all.      To    Garfield   common    schools    and    academies, 
planted  thick  by  the  New  England  element,  over  the  Western   Reserve 
of  Ohio,  presented  ampler  opportunities,  wooing  him  with  all  their  cap- 
tivating enticements  to  the  high  privileges  of  learning.     Lincoln  had  for 
his  chiefest  means  of  culture  the  Bible  and  Shakespeare — fortunately  for 
him  and  for  all,  the  two  supreme  books  in  all  the  world's  literatures. 
For  the  rest,  his  great  teachers  were  the  silent  forest,  the  prairie,  the 
river,  the  sweet  heavens,  and  calm  stars.     Garfield  pressed  all  the  gates 
of  knowledge,  "on  golden  hinges  turning,"  wide  open  before  him,  with 
freest  ranges  and  amplest  privileges,  in  the  world's  manifold  literatures. 
Religion  shone  with  but  a  feeble  and  indifferent  light  along  the  pathway 
of  Lincoln's  childhood  and  youth.     It  beat  with  intense  fervors  around 
Garfield's    cradle,    home,  and    school   life.     Lincoln    excelled    in    native 
greatness;  Garfield,  in  acquired  power.     Genius,  bending  over  their  cra- 
dles, touched  the  lips  of  each  with  her  sacred  fire.     Lincoln  had  a  plain 
simple,  roundabout  common  sense,  and  in  the  apprehension  of  a  great 
principle  and  the  clear,  apt,  forcible  statement  of  the  same  in  its  com- 
pleteness, so  as  to  be  at  once  apprehended  and  forever  impressed  on  the 
common  consciousness  of  the  people,  he  had  no  peer;  but,  like  Hamlet, 
his  thought  was  served  by  a  will  tardy  of  action,  never  moving  ahead  of 
the    common    convictions    of  the    people,    often    lagging    behind    their 
demands.     Garfield  fused  thought,  feeling,  and  action.      His  will  waited 
promptly  on  his  intellect.     He  believed  action  to  be  greater  than  thought, 
and    lived    out    his    convictions.     Lincoln,    though    sparkling    with  wit, 
humor,  and  jest,  like  the  sunlit  waves  of  the   sea,   had,  in  the   solemn 
depths  below,  the  infinite  sadness  of  the  same  sea,  with  the  same  break 
and   undertow  and   moan  on  the  gray,  cold   stones  of  the  world.     With 
the  blood  of  the   enthralled  race  coursing  his  veins,  the  pulsing  of  his 
soul  beat  rhythmic  with  the  wail  of  their  woes ;  and  he  walked  the  earth, 
going  up  to  his   high  sacrificial  altar  for  their  redemption,  in  the  gloom 
of  its  forecasting  shadow.     Garfield,  jubilant  as  the  leaping   rills  of  the 
homes  of  his  ancestors,  walked  the  earth  bravely,  joyfully,  in  the  vigor  of 
a  strong  manhood;  yet  he,  likewise,  went  up  to  the  same  sacrificial  altar, 
with  like  foreshadowings. 


28o  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

"Souls  destined  to  o'erleap  the  vulgar  lot, 
And  mould  the  world  unto  the  scheme  of  God, 
Have  a  foreconsciousness  of  their  high  doom." 

Thus,  with  a  quickness  of  succession  that  would  have  startled  into 
insecurity  an}'  throne  of  the  world,  this  nation  has  been  called  to 

"  Mourn  for  the  men  of  amplest  influence. 
Yet  clearest  of  ambitious  crime, 
Our  greatest,  yet  with  least  pretense. 
Rich  in  saving  common  sense, 
And  as  the  greatest  only  are 
In  their  simplicity  sublime — 
Such  were  they  whom  we  deplore." 

Gathered  thus  under  the  shadow  of  this  second  great  national  sacri- 
fice and  sorrow,  while  the  sisterhood  of  States  stands  weeping,  as  he  is 
being  laid  to  his  peaceful  rest,  and  the  civdlized  world  waits  with  uncov^ered 
head,  what  is  the  lesson  and  the  behest  to  us?  He  who  so  recently 
ascended  to  supreme  power  in  the  land,  under  apparently  the  most  favor- 
ing conditions  and  the  most  brilliant  auspices  ever  attending  such  acces- 
sion, was  no  sooner  seated  in  his  place  of  power  than  the  clouds  of  evil 
omen  gather  black,  the  mutterings  of  evil  storm-spirits,  full  of  all  trea- 
sons, strategies,  and  spoil-lusts,  grow  thick,  loud,  and  furious,  and,  hurl- 
ing a  bolt,  smite  the  unsuspecting  victim,  lifting  him  from  his  seat  of 
power  to  the  cross  of  sacrificial  suffering,  and,  for  eighty  days,  hanging 
there,  teaching  the  nation,  yea,  the  world,  lessons  never  so  taught  before. 
During  these  days  the  people  have  stood  with  uncovered  head  and 
unsandaled  feet,  in  unavailing  sorrow,  or  bowed  reverently  in  suppliant 
agony.  Political  fever  heats  have  been  cooled,  passions  subdued,  ani- 
mosities forgotten,  and,  like  the  Hebrew  people,  we  have  dwelt  fast  by 
Horeb  and  Sinai,  waiting,  listening,  for  the  will  of  God.  Thus  chastened 
and  toned  shall  we  now  pass  on  and  up  to  the  promised  land  of  political 
purity  and  freedom,  up  to  the  Mount  of  Beatitudes,  where  await  blessings 
manifold  for  the  politically  regenerate?  or  must  we  wander  forty  years  in 
the  desert  of  incompetency  and  vacillation,  till  a  generation  of  incompe- 
tents are  dead,  and  a  masterful  one  arises?  or,  still  worse,  shall  we  go 
immediately  back  and  down  to  our  former  Egyptian  bondage,  for  the 
sake  of  its  political  flesh  pots  and  garlics?  May  God  grant  us  the  faith 
and  courage  to  go  forward  and  up,  and  graciously  lead  us  by  his  pillar  of 
cloud  by  day  and  of  fire  by  night. 

To  this  end  our  first  and  imperative  duty  is  to  devoutly  pray  that 
to  our  new  leader  there  may  come,  if  they  have  not  already  come,  higher 
life  and  nobler  purposes.     A  man  full  of  native  impulses,  fine  and  noble, 


SERMONS.  281 

}'et  who  has,  hitherto,  been  a  most  abject  satrap  to  poHtical  despots;  a 
most  servile  slave  to  machine  taskmasters;  a  most  nimble  runner  and 
most  shameless  dancer  before  the  machine's  triumphal  marches;  a  most 
faithful  devotee  and  most  willing  organ  grinder  at  political  wassail  and 
orgy.  He  has  already  given  happy  omens  of  a  better  and  nobler 
future.  Heaven  grant  him  grace  and  courage  to  continue  and  improve 
in  welldoing. 

Not  to  leaders  alone  is  necessity  for  change  of  life  and  purpose. 
Political  juggernautism  is  the  great  and  crying  evil  in  the  politics  of  the 
day.  The  shadow  of  its  overtowering  machine  darkens  the  land.  It  is 
crushing  all  political  manhood  out  of  its  devotees,  who  blindly,  frantically, 
throw  themselves  beneath  its  massive  iron  wheels.  Their  blood  spurts 
over  the  land.  We  all  see  its  bloody,  ponderous  wheels  go  round,  the 
noisome  wind  from  which  blows  in  all  our  faces.  It  was  in  his  attempt 
to  stay  its  onward  progress  that  our  martyr  President  sacrificed  his 
life.  As  Hamilcar,  at  the  sacred  altar,  swore  his  son  Hannibal  to  eternal 
enmity  to  Rome,  so,  young  men,  laying  your  hands  upon  your  coun- 
try's altar,  thus  dripping  with  this  sacrificial  blood,  swear  eternal  enmity 
to  this  great  enemy  of  our  country's  weal.  And,  having  taken  this  oath, 
may  you  as  faithfully  fulfill  its  obligations  as  did  Hannibal.  The  welfare 
and  glory  of  your  country  is  to  soon  come  to  your  keeping.  See  that  it 
suffer  no  harm  but  only  good  in  this  keeping.  You  will  need  all  the 
strength  and  courage  of  a  Hercules  to  clean  its  Augean  stables  of  their 
political  corruption. 

"  By  this  last  act  of  madness  they  slew  one  of  the  noblest  and  gen- 
tlest. In  taking  that  life  they  have  left  the  iron  hand  of  the  people  to 
fall  upon  them.  Love  is  in  front  of  the  throne  of  God,  but  justice  and 
judgment,  with  inexorable  tread,  follow  behind,  and  when  law  is  slighted 
and  mercy  despised,  then  comes  justice  with  her  hoodwinked  eyes,  and 
with  the  sword  and  scales.  From  every  gaping  wound  of  our  dead 
chief  let  the  voice  go  up  to  the  people,  to  see  to  it  that  our  house  is 
swept  and  garnished."  These  words  spoke  Garfield  on  the  death  of 
Lincoln — words  completely  applicable  to  him.  May  the  nation  so 
heed  his  warning  voice,  so  consecrate  and  use  his  life-sacrifice,  that  the 
on-coming  ages  may  be  enabled  to  say  of  both  Lincoln  and  Garfield: — 

"  In  the  beauty  of  the  lilies  Christ  was  borne  across  the  sea 
With  a  glory  in  his  boson  that  transfigures  you  and  me; 
As  he  died  to  make  men  holy,  so  they  died  to  make  men  free." 


282  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

BETHEL  THEORY  OF  THE  UNIUERSE. 
[Baccalaurate  sermon,  delivered  June  11,  1882.] 
"Bethel — house  of  God."     Gen.  29:19. 

Bethel — hou.se  of  God — with  angels  ascending  and  descending,  and 
God  standing  above,  was  found  by  Jacob,  as  he  went  out  into  the  wide 
world,  to  begin  life  for  himself  As,  from  his  Southern  home,  he  journeyed 
northward,  up  the  steeps  and  along  the  heights  of  that  splendid  land  of 
promise,  its  grandeurs  gleamed  with  ennobling  influences,  awaking  devout 
in.spirations.  Add  to  this  the  uncertainties,  the  apprehensions,  the  hopes, 
of  the  new  life  before  him,  and  it  is  not  surprising  that  when  at  eventide 
he  rested  his  head  upon  the  stone  pillow,  his  soul  was  subdued  to  that 
receptive  mood,  fit  for  divine  communings  and  revelations.     .     .     . 

Youth  is  preeminently  the  bethel  season  of  life.  The  soul  is  then 
keenly  alive  and  responsive  to  all  ennobling  and  divine  influences,  ready 
to  be  motived  and  guided  by  them,  to  the  extrusion  of  all  that  is  ignoble 
and  sordid.  It  is  thus  not  only  pertinent  but  important  that  every  youth 
should  interpret  aright  the  dignity  of  his  being,  the  divine  significance  of 
life  and  its  environments.  Indeed,  the  vital  question  at  this  period  is, 
What  do  we  find  the  universe  and  ourselves?  The  true  worth  of  living 
and  doing  depends  greatly  upon  the  answer  given  to  this  question. 

Humanity  has  given,  in  general  terms,  three  answers: — 

1.  AbctJielistic. — Atheism  gives  answer.  No  bethels  in  the  wide  uni- 
verse, because  no  God  in  the  wide  universe.  At  the  best,  the  universe  is 
but  the  result  of  an  unknown  and  unknowable  power,  working,  as  blind 
force,  without  purpose,  to  a  resistless,  unmeaning  end.  In  such  a  universe 
there  can  be  no  divine  personality  to  hold  communion  with  man,  and,  by 
his  presence,  make  sacred  either  persons,  places,  or  seasons.  Man  is  an 
orphan,  without  kith  or  kin  in  the  wide,  cold,  barren  voids.  No  spiritual 
relationships  respond  to  his  longings,  and  give  sympathy  and  aid.  Not 
a  few  there  be  who,  practically,  have  faith  in  nothing  higher  than  the 
smoke  of  one's  chimney  top.  whose  interests  sweep  no  wider  than  the 
lines  bounding  one's  real  estate,  whose  chief  pursuit  is  self-happiness. 

2.  Scnii-bethclistic. — Bethels,  occasional  and  special,  are  granted  by 
this  theory.  God,  as  the  infinite  mechanician,  constructed  the  universe 
in  a  little  period  of  intense  activity,  and,  setting  it,  machine-like,  in  motion, 
and  retiring  into  the  supreme  heavens,  left  it  to  run  its  time,  applying, 
now  and  then,  just  enough  of  occasional  or  special  providence  to  keep  it 
regulated    and    in   order.      In   such    a    universe  only   those    places    are 


SERMONS.  283 

bethels  wherein  some  special  providence  or  miraculous  interposition  has 
been  manifested;  and  only  such  seasons  as  are  specially  set  apart  to 
commemorate  these  events,  are  bethel  seasons.  Practically,  such  a  con- 
ception of  the  universe  tends  to  produce  in  its  recipients  a  like  spiritual 
condition.  The  main  sweep  of  life  will  be  mechanical  and  dry  and  hard, 
with  occasional  seasons  of  uplifting,  when  all  will  seem  swung  just  beneath 
the  eternal  throne,  and  to  run  in  shining  grooves. 

3.  BetJielistic. — The  bethellstic  doctrine  apprehends  the  universe  as  the 
living  temple  of  God — everywhere  and  perpetually  filled,  energized,  and 
controlled  by  his  presence  and  power.  He  is  the  arch-reality.  All  phe- 
nomena are  the  direct  expression  of  this  indwelling,  living  reality.  All 
the  ongoings  in  nature  are  di\'ine  operations.  The  laws  of  the  universe 
are  the  uniform  activities  of  the  unchanging  divine  personal  will,  lighted 
by  his  perfect  reason,  guided  by  purpose.  All  natural  agencies  are  thus 
modes  of  the  divine  activities.  This  avoids  the  paradox  of  an  active 
universe  and  an  inactive  Deity,  or  of  intense  activity  at  one  time  and 
quiescence  forever  after.  The  life  of  the  universe  is  a  perpetual  genera- 
tion, life  welling  forth  with  perpetual  efflux  from  the  infinite  source  of  all 
life.  Matter  is  the  objectized  divine  power,  known  as  force,  held  in  per- 
petual stableness  by  this  ever-present  and  unvarying  power.  Instead  of 
hard,  dead  matter  and  unyielding,  insensate,  mechanical  forces  and  lifeless 
forms,  choking  up  the  infinite  spaces,  there  is  everywhere  present  the 
conscious  spirit,  and  there  flows  the  eternal  stream  of  life,  power,  and 
deed,  of  the  all-pervading  Deit}-.  The  universe  is,  at  all  points  and  times, 
a  bethel,  glowing  and  glorified  with  divine  splendors.  Our  mathematics, 
physics,  zoologies,  psychologies,  and  theologies,  are  all  efforts  to  inter- 
pret and  explain  the  divine  thoughts,  plans,  purposes,  and  activities.     .    . 

4.  Bethclistic  Providence. — Divine  providence  is  at  once  universal  and 
particular,  e\'erywhere  and  alwaj-s  active,  with  the  general  uniformitx'  of 
God's  own  unvariableness,  and  with  the  diversity  and  adaptability  of  per- 
sonal will.  All  providence  is  thus  special,  yet  grounded  in  universal 
laws.  Gravitation,  light,  heat,  electricity,  are  primal,  natural  modes  of 
divine  providence.  Sunrise  and  sunset,  winter  and  summer,  spring  and 
autumn,  calm  and  storm,  flood  and  drought,  are  all  phases  of  the  perpetual 
presence  and  activity  of  God.  He  is  equally  near  and  equally  active  in 
all  places  and  in  all  seasons.  Thus  there  is  no  blind  fate,  no  remorseless 
necessity,  but  one  all-pervasive,  beneficent  keeper  and  guardian  of  all, 
the  shepherd  of  all  beings.  Instead  of  the  insensate  forces  of  an  uncon- 
scious and  unknown  and  unknowable  power,  the  universe  is  transfigured 
by  a  living,  conscious  .spirit,  a  personal   God,  a  beneficent  Father,  mani- 


284  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

Testing  himself  in  beginningless, endless  efflux  of  life,  as  a  beneficent  forth- 
putting  of  power,  ever  working  for  the  ends  of  perfection  in  all  created 
being.  When  the  spiritual  eye-power  becomes  clear  and  strong,  then, 
like  the  young  man  for  whom  Elisha  prayed,  we  see  all  the  mountains  of 
life  full  of  horses  and  chariots  of  fire,  messengers  of  God  to  work  his  will, 
in  all  nature  and  history. 

Man  is  no  orphaned  child  in  a  dead,  cold,  barren  universe,  with  no 
responsives  to  his  great  soul  needs,  but  a  child  enfolded  in  the  arms  of 
all-compassionate  fatherhood  and  motherhood,  ready  to  assuage  all  sor- 
rows, wipe  away  all  tears,  soothe  all  pains,  and  lift  up  and  strengthen. 
Wherever  we  stay,  he  is  our  sun  and  our  shade;  his  smile  is  in  the 
morning's  dawn  and  in  the  evening's  glow.  He  leads  the  way  wherever 
we  roam  by  land  or  sea.  For  such,  miracles  are  no  exceptional  occur- 
rences, but  everyday  realities.  All  times  and  events  are  full  of  them. 
The  divine  power  and  guiding  providence  and  self-verification  are  mani- 
fested in  all.  Such  assurance  lifts  from  the  regions  of  spiritual  night, 
with  its  clouds  and  shadows  of  doubt,  from  the  gray  dawn  of  philosophic 
truth,  to  the  noontide  splendors  of  living  faith.  All  systems  of  belief,  all 
forms  and  ceremonies  are  but  the  outward  expression  of  the  universal 
aspiration  for  this  indwelling  life.  All  progress,  all  Christian  civilization 
draws  its  life  from  this  divine  fountain. 

5.  BetJielistic  Lives. — If  such  be  the  universe,  in  its  nature  and  rela- 
tions, and  in  its  providential  ongoings,  much  more  must  it  be  with  man, 
the  child  of  God.  Every  soul  was  created  expressly  to  be  the  "temple 
of  the  living  God,"  as  Paul  teaches.  As  the  offspring  of  God,  man  was 
created  to  consciously  "live,  move,  and  have  his  being"  in  God. 
Humanity  is  the  highest  earthly  organ  of  the  divine  life  and  manifesta- 
tion— created  for  a  constant  in-living  and  intercourse  of  the  divine  with 
the  human.  Human  wisdom  is  the  outshining  of  the  divine  wisdom. 
"The  inspiration  of  the  Almighty  giveth  understanding."  He  is  illumed, 
vivified,  and  empowered  by  divine  wisdom  and  revelations.  His  love  is 
the  overflow  of  the  divine  love,  shed  abroad  in  his  nature.  His  growth 
in  grace  is  the  unfolding  of  the  supernatural  life."     .     .     . 

When  the  illumined  eye  of  the  spirit  is  enabled  to  apprehend  the 
universe  as  filled  and  lighted  by  the  divine  Presence,  the  whole  takes 
on  a  new  significancy  and  sacredness.  Nothing  is  any  longer  common 
or  unclean.  All  is  sacred.  One  no  longer  has  to  pass  beyond  the  veil 
into  the  holy  of  holies,  in  this  tabernacle  of  God,  to  find  him.  He  is 
without,  in  the  court  of  the  Gentiles,  as  well.  He  does  not  have  to  set 
apart  special  times  and  seasons  that  haply  he  may  find  him,  for  he  finds 


SERMONS.  255 

him  in  every  day  and  in  every  place,  by  land  and  sea,  in  the  dusty  high- 
ways and  in  business  marts  of  life,  as  well  as  in  closet,  or  cloister,  or 
church  service.  Every  bush  becomes  aflame  with  divine  glory^  and  the 
soul,  Moses-like,  stands  with  unsandaled  feet  listening  for  its  divine  mis- 
sion. It  will  hear  in  all  the  voices,  and  in  all  the  silences,  a  "sound  of 
soft  stillness,"  and,  Elijah- like,  stand  with  covered  face,  listening  to  the 
divine  teachings.  Such  a  soul  will  rise  above  all  wild  passion  and  nar- 
row, noisy  fanaticism,  which,  like  the  prophets  of  Baal,  seek  God  with 
crying  aloud,  shouting,  gesticulating,  cutting,  slashing,  leaping  upon  the 
altars,  and  all  that,  as  if  God  were  talking,  or  journeying,  or,  perchance, 
sleeping.  With  reverent  mien  and  hushed  voice,  in  truthful  assurance  of 
the  divine  Presence  and  power  to  bless  with  all  heavenly  benedictions,  it 
will  seek  and  find. 

As  the  spirit  rises  above  the  mist,  and  murk,  and  storm  of  the  low, 
and  narrow,  and  passionate,  into  the  clear,  serene  presence  of  the  Divine, 
it  finds  gentleness,  peace,  and  sweet  restfulness,  unperturbed  by  worldly 
turmoil,  unswayed  by  prejudice  and  passion;  the  frivolous,  the  vain,  the 
unworthy,  the  fanatical,  will  beat  and  surge  beneath  unheeded.  The 
deepest,  highest,  divinest  experiences  of  such  a  one  will  be  unutterable 
by  the  noise  of  speech,  as  were  those  of  Paul  on  being  caught  up  to  the 
third  heaven.  Every  divinely  living  person  becomes  voiceless  in  pro- 
portion to  the  sacredness  of  his  experiences.  Such  cannot  be  talked. 
When  Moses  returned  from  that  forty  days'  communion  with  God  on 
the  heights  of  Sinai,  his  face  so  radiant  with  the  eternal  glory  that  the 
people  could  not  steadfastly  behold  him,  he  veiled  it,  and,  though  the 
outward  law,  amid  lightning  and  thunder,  was  graven  on  tables  of  stone, 
no  talk  was  ever  made  of  this  indwelling  and  outshining  glory. 

6.  Bcthelistic  Inpiejice.—lt  is  by  just  this  outshining  glory  that  the 
divinest  experiences  of  life  are  revealed.  It  will  shine  out  from  all  true 
lives,  through  all  the  hindrances  of  ignorance,  of  uncongenial  tempera- 
ment, unfavorable  circumstances,  and  reveal,  by  tone,  and  bearing,  and 
word,  and  purpose,  and  action,  its  essential  nature.  Satan,  so  the  legend 
runs,  on  a  time  besought  God  to  give  into  his  keeping  Saint  Benedict, 
"the  learnedly  ignorant  and  wisely  unlearned,"  that  he  might  test  him 
after  the  manner  of  Job.  The  request  was  granted,  and,  taking  him  to 
his  dominions,  Satan  thought  to  corrupt  him  to  its  ways;  but  the  silent, 
unconscious  influence  of  his  saintly  character  was  such  that  the  fallen 
spirits  were  irresistibly  drawn  to  him,  and  began  to  pattern  after  him. 
Satan,  alarmed  for  the  safety  of  his  realm,  besought  his  immediate 
removal,  lest  the  influence  of  his  gentleness  and  heavenly  grace  should 
depopulate  hell. 


286  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

This  legend  aptly  illustrates  the  unconscious  influence  of  a  God- 
entempled  character.     .     .     . 

This  gracious  power  comes  not  to  those  who  seek  as  observers,  who 
seek  something  to  tell,  and  to  talk  about,  but  rather  to  lowly,  simple, 
pure,  open-souled,  sincere  ones,  who  are  content  to  "know  and  be 
unknown"  in  all  divine  knowledges  and  experiences.  These  are  the 
"pure  in  heart,"  who  see  God,  and  God  reveals  himself  to  the  world 
through  them.  In  and  through  such  we  find  higher  and  diviner  degrees 
of  greatness  than  worldly  wisdom  and  culture  and  experience  can  give. 
This  influence  discards  all  worldly  trappings  and  circumstance.  This 
ineffable  union  of  God  with  man  by  his  indwelling  Spirit,  is  that  divine- 
human  life  which  Christ  came  to  reingenerate  humanity  with,  and  wher- 
ever found  touches  with  new  life  and  spiritual  beauty,  and  gives  infallible 
assurance  that  God  walks  the  earth  again  in  the  person  of  his  child.  As 
lole  said  she  knew  Hercules  to  be  a  god,  because  "  he  conquered,  whether 
he  .stood,  or  walked,  or  sat,  or  whatever  thing  he  did,"  so  these  highest 
and  divinest  types  conquer,  not  through  much  speaking  in  public  gather- 
ings and  on  the  corners  of  the  streets,  or  in  the  market  place,  but  silently, 
yet  speaking  eloquently,  irresistibly,  whether  standing,  or  sitting,  or 
walking,  in  all  commonest  deeds.  It  is  given  only  when  we  ha\'e  entered 
the  closet  of  our  being,  as  Jesus  tells  us,  and  shut  tight  the  door  against 
all  outside  influences.  Then  does  the  hearing  and  answering  God  reward 
us  openly  by  the  outshining  "in  soft  stillness"  of  his  life  in  our  lives. 
Whenever  and  to  whomsoever  the  divine  One  is  thus  revealed,  there 
appears  the  mount  of  transfiguration,  with  all  celestial  beings  and  influ- 
ences bright  and  shining. 

Such  a  one  carries  the  fragrance  and  glories  of  heaven  wherever  he 
goes.  Such  lives  unconsciously  touch  the  springs  of  life  in  others,  and  are 
thus  ever  propagating  themselves  by  the  great  and  pervasive  law  of  silent 
influence.  Such  influence  comes  like  the  dew  of  heaven,  softly,  imper- 
ceptibly, yet  cooling  the  feverish,  reviving  the  drooping.  It  carries  heal- 
ing on  its  wings.  It  is  noiseless  as  gravity,  and  as  ever  active.  Like 
light  from  a  luminous  center,  it  streams  out  upon  all  within  its  sweep. 
Its  possessors  are  indeed  "the  light  of  the  world."  They  are  the  lights 
set  on  a  hill  that  cannot  be  hid.  As  in  the  material  world,  so  in  the 
spiritual,  where  the  light  is  most  radiant,  the  shadows  fall  the  deepest, 
and  those  in  the  gloom  of  these  shadows  can  best  realize  the  ble.ssings  of 
the  beneficent  light,  while  the  lights  themselves  may  be  all  unconscious 
of  this  benignity. 

7.  Betliciistic   Workers. — As  in  unconscious  influence,  so  in  voluntary 


SERMONS.  287 

work,  the  highest  and  divinest  is  the  most  quiet,  without  any  loud  report 
of  itself.  As  we  rise  in  the  scale  of  activities  through  all  realms,  the 
working  powers  ever  decrease  in  noise  and  tumult  as  they  increase  in 
■energy  and  efficiency.  The  serene  activities  are  those  which  tell  for  the 
higher  good.  God  works  in  infinite  quietness,  yet  in  infinite  power,  save 
when  his  power  is  disturbed  or  opposed  by  the  imperfect  or  the  wicked. 
The  noisy  and  the  turbulent  are  the  baneful.  Truth,  right,  beauty,  good- 
ness, in  their  essential  normal  activites,  are  peaceful  and  beneficent. 
Thus  it  is  with  human  activity.  The  gentle,  serene  activities  are  those 
which  ever  make  for  good.  The  bustling,  the  noisy,  money-getting,  war, 
politics,  spnng  from  the  lower  and  coarser  wants  and  propensities,  while 
culture,  refinement,  religion,  come,  as  do  light  and  life,  in  still  streams, 
and  like  them  tell  for  all  that  is  cleanest,  fairest,  and  best.  These  are 
embosomed  in  undying  beauties.     These  grow  as  the  trees  grow.     .     .      . 

8.  Bctlidistic  Peace. — Lives  ensphered,  motived,  and  missioned  of 
God  become  partakers  of  his  own  peace.  "Peace,  be  still,"  comes  as  a 
command  to  all  the  lower,  tumultuous  passions,  comes  as  a  benediction 
to  the  spirits  lighted  by  the  Sun  of  Righteousness,  as  they  fulfill  their 
appointed  mission.  As  a  bell  ringing  out  clear  and  distinct,  through  fog 
and  mist,  is  the  voice  of  such  to  the  cloud-enveloped  world.  Such  lives 
are  no  longer  nettled  and  stung,  rasped  and  bittered.  Without  this 
inliving  and  ensphering  peace  of  God,  even  our  reforms,  our  benevolences, 
our  religious  enterprises  are  liable  to  degenerate  into  anxieties,  rivalries, 
and  worries,  full  of  ponderous  machinery,  whose  thud  and  clatter  drown 
all  of  the  sweeter,  gentler,  diviner  influences.  .  .  .  We  need  to  learn 
that  to  plant,  and  nurture,  and  grow  truth  is  the  surest  way  to  root  out 
error.  This  is  the  divine  method.  Plant,  water,  and  hoe,  and  God  will 
supply  the  sun,  and  dew,  and  rain,  and  give  the  increase.  If  you  wish 
your  fire  to  burn  brightly,  be  not  continually  poking  and  punching  it. 
Learn  to  "labor  and  to  wait."  Rise  above  the  damps  and  fogs,  out  of 
the  clays  and  clogs  of  earth,  into  the  dry,  clear  air,  pure  light,  and  calm 
breezes,  that  reign  in  the  spiritual  realm,  where  all  is  "eternal,  beautiful, 
serene,  sublime." 

9.  Betlielistic  Joy. — To  this  peace  there  is  added  the  positive,  the 
higher  element,  divine  joy.  When  the  soul  is  entirely  entempled  of  God, 
and  working  on  the  plane  of  his  purpose,  and  with  the  inspirations  of 
his  Spirit,  divine  ardors  then  fill  all  its  sails,  imparting  joy,  which  the 
world  can  neither  give  nor  take,  transcending  all  worldly  happiness  as 
the  spiritual  transcends  the  animal.  A  spirit  thus  attuned  becomes  an 
instrument  through  which  all  heavenly  harmonies  play.    .    .    .    This  is  the 


288  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

peace,  joy,wKich  Christ  bequeathed  to  his  followers,  and  which  the  Divine 
Comforter  when  it  comes  shall  make  complete.  It  was  for  this  joy  that 
he  "endured  the  cross,  despising  the  shame."  It  was  this  same  joy  that 
lifted  the  apostles  above  burdens,  toils,  persecutions,  all  manner  of 
temptations.  It  has  enabled  all  like  minded,  motived,  and  empowered,  to 
work  their  work  with  a  steady,  strong  hand  and  joyous  heart.  However 
care-encumbered  and  work-weary,  however  heavily  life's  burdens  may 
press,  this  joy  perpetually  refreshes  and  invigorates.  Though  called  to 
walk  the  world's  hot  lava  beds,  walk  with  blistering  feet,  or  to  struggle 
on  benumbed  by  the  world's  fogs  and  damps,  yet  this  divine  joy  will 
triumph  over  all.  It  lifts  above  all  despondencies,  glooms,  disappoint- 
ments, sicknesses,  forsakings,  losses,  lifts  into  the  sweet  peace  of  the 
divine  airs  and  the  joyous  radiance  of  the  divine  light.  It  enables  the 
willing  and  the  receptive  spirit  to  mount  as  on  eagle  wing,  to  run  without 
fainting,  to  work  without  wearying. 

Young  friends,  as  you  are  soon  to  pass  from  these  halls  of  learning, 
you  find  yourselves  just  entering  the  vestibule  of  your  life-work.  The 
realization  of  your  hopes,  the  fulfillment  of  your  mission  is  yet  seen 
only  dimly  in  the  distance.  The  first  pages  only  of  your  life's  history 
have  as  yet  been  written.  Your  heavenly  Father  made  your  lives  to  be 
sublime,  even  divine.  They  are  full  of  opportunites,  splendid  possibilities, 
which  once  let  slip  can  never  be  recalled.  The  undaunting  assurance  of 
something  better  than  anything  yet  attained  is  a  great  and  determining 
force  in  all  effort.  Add  to  this  the  experimental  assurance  that  you  are 
agencies  of  a  living,  present,  guiding  divinity,  and  you  become  empow- 
ered from  on  high  to  work  your  work.  Let  your  lives  be  filled  and 
motived  of  God,  and  they  will  move  on  unfalteringly,  trustfully,  bravely. 
As  no  soul  is  utterly  desolate  as  long  as  there  is  one  being  in  whom  it 
can  trust,  so  no  soul  whose  trust  is  in  God  can  be  without  consolation, 
yea,  peace,  joy,  ever  filled  with  the  divine  ardors.  Talent,  wit,  learning, 
genius,  sentiment,  sympathy,  love,  will  all  be  ennobled,  glorified. 

In  after  years  as  you  recall  your  school  friends,  you  will  find  some 
passing  their  lives  in  affluence  and  ease,  some  struggling  and  harried  with 
penury  and  sickness,  some  whose  morning  sun  promised  a  resplendent 
noon,  hidden  by  the  clouds  of  inglorious  inactivity,  some  given  to  clean- 
handed honor  and  self-forgetting  heroisms,  while  a  few,  standing  on  the 
high  places  of  the  earth,  on  the  headlands  of  progress,  are  beckoning 
their  fellows  to  follow.     .     .     . 

Remember  that  the  richest  and  worthiest  legacy  you  can  bequeath  to 
the  world  is  a  noble  character.     No  character  is  great  save  as  it  embodies 


SERMONS.  289 

and  realizes  great  principles.  These  principles  must,  however,  be  ener- 
gized by  the  Divine  Presence  and  power  in  order  to  give  them  vitality^ 
growth,  and  fruitage.  One  thus  endued  has  something  better  and  greater 
than  talents,  wealth,  learning,  or  position,  something  that  enables  him  to 
walk  the  world  open-eyed,  calm-browed,  serene-souled,  and  departing  to 
leave  a  legacy  more  enduring  than  stiver  or  gold,  marble  or  granite, 
something  that  shall  grow  in  evergreen  beauty,  and  bear  fruit  for  the 
healing  of  humanity. 

As  my  last  word  to  you,  permit  me  to  give  expression  to  the  prayer 
and  the  hope  that,  as  you  go  forth  into  the  wide  world,  you  may  find  it 
everywhere  and  at  all  times  a  bethel,  with  angels  ascending  and  descend- 
ing all  along  life's  pathway.  May  you  ever  be  entempled  of  God,  and 
your  lives,  your  influence  be  continuous  manifestations  of  his  living  pres- 
ence— full  of  infinite  peace  and  joy — joy  that  shall  be  a  constant  foretaste 
of  that  awaiting  you  when  you  shall  be  gathered  home  to  heaven,  where 
the  river  of  life  runs  clear  and  perpetual,  where  the  tree  of  life  is  ever 
in  bloom  and  in  fruit,  where  there  is  no  night,  nor  need  of  lamp  or  sun, 
for  the  Lord  God  shall  give  you  light,  and  you  shall  reign  forever  and 
ever.     Amen. 


THE    SHEKINAH. 

[Baccalaureate  sermon  before  the  graduating  class  of  Alfred  University,  July  i,  1883.] 
The  Shekinah  was  the  appellation  given  in  the  Targum  and  by  the 
later  Hebrews  and  the  early  Christians  to  the  Divine  Presence,  revealed 
in  visible  glory,  majesty,  and  power,  inclusive,  in  its  larger  sense,  of  those 
manifold  manifestations  expressed  in  symbols  of  light,  fire,  flame,  and 
cloud,  oftentimes  with  attendant  evangels  of  God,  bearing  messages,  com- 
missions, protection,  and  guidance  to  men.  The  term  originated  as  a 
periphrasis  for  God,  considered  as  dwelling  with  his  people,  to  avoid 
ascribing  to  him  corporeity. 

The  Shekinah,  in  this  inclusive  sense,  becomes  symbol  of  divine  and 
angelic  agencies,  which  have  been  ever  with  and  about  man,  coming  and 
dwelling  and  going  on  these  spiritual  messages.  Its  cherubim,  with 
flaming  sword,  have  guarded  the  Edens  of  innocence,  its  voice  of  gentle 
stillness  imparted  inspirations,  its  burning  bush  given  commission,  its 
pillar  of  cloud  and  of  fire  guarded  and  guided,  its  cloud  of  glory  enfolded 
the  Sinais  of  law  and  the  mounts  of  transfiguration,  filled  tabernacles  and 
temples  and  overshadowed  the  mercy  seats,  its  fires  lighted  altars  of  sac- 

19 


290  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

rifice  and  devotion,  its  chariots  and  horses  appeared  on  the  heights, 
casting  the  sheen  of  their  glory  over  the  vales  of  life,  its  evangels  pro- 
claimed peace  and  glad  tidings,  its  cloven  tongues  of  flame  preached  in 
manifold  tongues,  its  heavenly  splendors  made  glorious  the  mounts  of 
ascension. 

The  bale-fires  of  evil,  on  the  other  hand,  have  gleamed  lurid  from  all 
the  fen-lands  of  error,  from  off  all  the  passion-driven  seas  of  wrong.  The 
mission  of  their  devotees  is  negative  and  destructive.  Without  supplying 
their  places  with  better  principles  or  nobler  institutions  for  the  resting  of 
faith  or  clustering  of  sympathy,  they  deny  or  doubt  all  the  innate  and 
firmest  beliefs  in  God  and  great  principles,  demolish  sacred  and  cherished 
institutions.  Carpings,  threatenings,  rash  innovations,  noisy  fanaticisms, 
wild  ultraisms  characterize  their  pseudo-systems.  Scylla  and  Charybdis 
threaten  their  course,  with  no  safe  seas  beyond.  The  sirocco's  deadly 
breath  sweeps  before  them.  Smouldering  ruins,  blackened  and  charred 
by  the  fires  of  strife  and  war,  mark  their  track. 

Man,  left  to  himself,  wanders  amid  doubt,  temptation  and  darkness. 
He  feels  the  latent  energies  of  his  being  awakening  and  becoming  restless 
and  active.  The  world,  with  the  wand  of  its  enchantment,  touches  all 
his  senses.  Vague  yearnings  and  aimless  seeking  control  him.  Wild 
dreams  beget  fitful  activities.  He  attains  and  is  unsatisfied,  enjoys  and 
is  ungratified.  His  wayward  impulses  lead  to  multitudinous  schemes. 
Land  and  sea  are  traversed  in  search  of  something  to  meet  the  cravings 
of  the  spirit;  yet,  when  the  utmost  that  the  world  can  give,  is  obtained, 
all  turns  to  bitterness — to  apples  of  Sodom.  He  is  left  still  poor  and 
craving,  while  the  waves  of  time,  with  their  ceaseless  ebb  and  flow,  wash 
the  sands  of  life  from  under  his  feet.  The  soul,  tempest-tossed,  like  a 
ship  in  a  night  of  storm,  with  its  compass  unbo.xed,  its  rudder  gone,  its 
lights  extinguished,  drifting,  amid  shriek  of  wind  and  howl  of  waves,  hard 
upon  destruction,  must  have  help  to  reach  a  haven  of  safety. 

Merely  human  aid  is  not  sufficient.  Man  soon  outgrows  his  self- 
constructed  systems  of  help.  He  needs  and  seeks  something  which, 
rising  above  simply  the  pleasure  of  fancy,  the  gratification  of  the  taste 
for  beauty,  or  enlightenment  to  the  reason,  shall  lead  the  spirit  up  in  per- 
petual aspiration  and  endeavor.  Scientific,  literary,  aesthetic,  and  philo- 
sophic culture  have  sought  in  vain  to  meet  this  high  and  imperative 
need  of  man.  In  addition  have  come  the  ethenic  religions  of  the  world. 
These,  while  possessing  many  ennobling  elements,  have  been  lacking  in 
those  living  energies  that  give  perpetual  progress;  hence,  when  peoples, 
like  those  grand  old  nations — Chaldea,  Egypt,  India,  Persia — came  up  to 


SERMONS.  291 

the  limit  of  the  progressive  forces  of  theirs,  thenceforward  immobihty  and 
decay  set  in.  Such  is  the  result  in  all  systems  and  religions  not  of  God, 
and  guarded  and  guided  by  his  Shekinab. 

The  Shekinah  comes  to  man's  needs,  with  its  protection  and  help ;  to 
his  faculty  for  spiritual  commerce  and  supernatural  beholding,  with  its 
illuminations  and  revelations;  to  his  aspirations,  with  its  inspirations;  to 
his  endeav^ors,  with  its  guidance.  To  each  one,  not  hiding  himself  away, 
as  God  walks  in  the  garden  of  the  soul,  but  yielding  reverent  trust  and 
glad  obedience,  it  becomes  a  pillar  of  cloud  and  of  fire,  giving  assurance 
that,  whatever  befalls,  it  will  be  his  front  and  rear  guard,  and  that  its 
angels  shall  uphold  and  strengthen.  With  the  Psalmist  he  can  sa}': 
"The  Lord  is  my  rock  and  my  fortress  and  my  deliverer,"  "my  buckler," 
and  "my  high  tower."  "The  Lord  is  my  Shepherd;  I  shall  not  want. 
He  maketh  me  to  lie  down  in  green  pastures;  he  leadeth  me  beside  the 
still  waters." 

The  Shekinah,  in  the  night  watches  of  adversity,  becomes  a  pillar  of 
fire,  lighting  up  the  gloom  and  blackness,  wherein  we  should  otherwise 
grope  and  fall.  It  stands  a  wall  of  darkness  before  all  foes.  Its  light 
discloses  heights  and  depths  of  the  divine  compassion,  unseen  in  the  day- 
light of  prosperity.  As  the  night,  with  its  stars,  reveals  an  infinitude  of 
worlds,  undreamed  of  by  day,  so  the  Shekinah  that  lights  the  night 
encampments  of  adversity  and  suffering,  reveals  infinitudes  of  divine 
mercy,  unperceived  in  the  sunshine  of  prosperity.  When  the  world  for- 
sakes, foes  press,  friends  prove  false,  slander  and  falsehood  pursue,  povert}' 
and  want  annoy,  sickness  lays  low,  pain  tortures,  death  removes  the  light 
of  life,  and  the  eyes  become  dim  with  weeping,  and  the  voice  full  of  tears, 
then  the  Shekinah  light  of  divine  love  and  mercy  shines  down  upon  the 
soul,  with  its  before  unmanifested  healing  and  peace-giving  consolations. 
In  all  life's  fiery  furnace  the  form  of  the  Fourth  is  ever  walking  with  the 
trustful  to  deliver.  The  confidence  of  the  Psalmist  becomes  his,  and  he 
can  sing:  "Yea,  though  I  walk  through  the  valley  and  shadow  of  death, 
I  will  fear  no  evil;  for  thy  rod  and  thy  staff  they  comfort  me." 

The  Shekinah  is  not  simply  a  guarding  but  likewise  a  guiding  provi- 
dence. Its  guide  of  the  Hebrew  people  is  typical  of  the  divine  dealings 
with  all  peoples  and  all  individuals.  Following  its  command  to  go  for- 
ward, they  were  led  from  servitude  up  to  Sinai  and  the  law,  up  to  nation- 
ality and  freedom,  up  to  the  gospel  dispensation,  opening  the  way  to 
modern  Christian  civilization.  All  human  history,  under  the  guidance 
of  the  Shekinah,  is  ever  working  out  the  divine  purpose.  Paul,  in  his 
declaration  that  nations  were  created  and  located  to  the  end  of  seeking 
God,  teaches  this  doctrine. 


292  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

Thus,  Shekinah  led,  humanity  has  ever  been  multiplying,  replenishing, 
conquering.  Its  progress,  Hebrew  like,  has  not  been  one  uninterrupted 
progress.  Its  victories  have  not  been  without  their  defeats.  Its  battles 
have  often  wavered  and  failed,  but  to  be  renewed  till  victory  be  won.  It 
oftentimes  has  returned  upon  its  track.  Oftentimes,  with  parched  lips, 
footsore  steps,  fevered  brow,  and  fainting  heart,  it  has  trailed  its  weary 
way  across  th"e  arid  wastes  of  far-reaching  deserts,  and  up  Sinaitic  heights, 
through  hot  and  pestilential  climes,  through  frigid  zones,  with  their  night 
and  cold.  Humanity,  though  wandering,  wavering,  halting,  fainting,  has 
made  progress.  Centuries  may  have  rolled  away  while  taking  this  for- 
ward step,  while  gaining  a  new  height,  yet  the  step  has  been  taken,  the 
height  gained.  In  its  progress  it  has  lifted  its  hand  in  labor,  and  islands 
and  continents  have  been  peopled;  cities,  nations,  empires  have  arisen. 
It  has  given  its  brain  to  thought,  and  new  truths,  sciences,  arts,  and 
industries  have  appeared.  The  resultant  is  civilization.  In  this  pre- 
visional  planning  and  providential  care  and  guidance  of  God,  peoples, 
nations,  families,  with  all  their  achievements  in  civilization,  are  agencies 
with  which  he  is  working  for  the  highest  good  of  the  individual, — per- 
sonal perfection.     .     . 

The  Shekinah,  to  a  spirit  waiting,  longing,  Elijah-like,  in  a  voice  of 
soft  stillness  speaks  with  a  divine  behest,  calling  to  life's  mission.  On 
the  Horebs  of  life,  in  the  higher  moods  of  the  spirit,  when  it  stands  with 
uncovered  head  and  unsandaled  feet,  the  Shekinah  call  is  heard  from 
every  flaming  bush  of  opportunity.  It  is  befitting  that,  not  in  the  fire 
and  whirlwind  and  storm  of  appetite,  ambition,  and  passion,  but  in  such 
calm  and  receptive  moments,  the  high  commission  should  come.  This 
call  and  commission  come  not  alone  to  the  great  world  leaders,  teachers, 
legislators,  prophets,  apostles,  reformers,  but  as  well  to  the  humblest 
livers  and  doers,  in  all  conditions  and  pursuits  in  life. 

Each  individual  has  a  personal  call  and  commission,  and,  in  order  to 
make  it  the  most  effective  possible,  this  call  is  to  a  definite  life-work- 
This  is  a  divine  archetypal  biography,  which,  if  lived  out,  will  lead  nearer 
and  more  near  to  the  divinely  perfect  forevermore.  Here  lies  the  line  of 
march  toward  this  land  of  promise.  The  special  polarities  of  each  indi- 
vidual are  attracted,  as  the  needle  to  the  loadstone,  to  this  line,  awaken- 
ing aspirations,  enkindling  longings,  determining  endeavors.  These 
become  so  many  censers  upon  which  the  divine  fire  is  to  be  lighted. 
Strong,  many-handed  workers  in  the  versatile  utilities  and  multitudinous 
enterprise;  sincere  truth  and  law  seekers  and  doers  of  right  and  justice; 
steady-eyed,  clear-visioned,  cool-iicaded,  sure-footed  leaders  and  guides; 


SERMONS.  2'93 

lives  delicate,  fragrant,  melodious,  harmonious;  joyous  lives,  which  are 
a  ceaseless  benediction,  full  of  all  gentle  amenities;  gracious  lives,  rich  in 
long-suffering,  compassion,  and  charity;  lives  of  faith,  trustful,  serene, 
who  dwell  in  a  perpetual  Sabbath  of  the  soul — to  all  these  the  Shekinah 
gives  commission  to  help  human  endeavor;  to  lift  ignorance  and  wrong, 
as  day  lifts  the  veil  of  night;  to  lead  through  swamp,  over  desert,  up 
mountain,  in  human  progress  ;  to  teach  beauty,  as  do  the  delicacy  of  the 
violet,  the  fragrance  of  the  rose,  the  melody  of  the  aeolian  harp,  the 
grandeur  of  the  cedars  of  Lebanon,  or  the  oaks  of  Bashan;  to  reconcile 
discords,  feed  the  hungry,  clothe  the  naked,  carry  healing  and  health  to 
the  wounded  in  spirit,  administering  oil  and  balm;  to  give  the  rest  and 
peace  and  joy  of  religious  trust. 

The  Shekinah,  in  calling  to  and  preparing  for  these  respective  mis- 
sions, meets  man  with  all  his  varying  degrees  of  capacity,  and  at  all  points 
of  progress,  walks  carefulU'  with  the  feeble  in  mental  grasp  or  low  in 
culture,  thence  through  all  ranges  of  capacity  and  stages  of  culture  and 
progress,  satisfies  all  spiritual  needs,  leads  up  to  higher  planes,  and  opens 
wider,  ever  ascending,  and  diviner  prospects.  It  touches  every  field  of 
learning,  and  invigorates  every  noble  enterpri.se.  It  innovates,  not  by 
simply  tearing  down,  but  lays  deeper  and  broader  foundations,  and  uprears 
nobler  structures,  not  by  destroying  or  petrifying,  but  rather  it  gives  life, 
growth,  progress.  Its  reformatory  processes  are,  indeed,  sometimes  very 
fiery  furnaces,  but  thereby  smelting  the  pure  ore  from  the  dross.  Its 
light,  pure,  bright,  penetrating,  wards  off  mildew  and  rust,  and  awakens 
earnest  seeking,  before  which  parties,  sects,  and  creeds,  with  their  lob- 
sided,  partial,  and  stereotyped  opinions,  forms,  and  formulas,  must  give 
way.     ... 

The  Shekinah,  in  doing  this,  leads  from  the  animal  to  the  spiritual, 
from  the  human  to  the  divine.  As  the  progress  of  humanity  is  from 
savagism  up  through  barbarism  to  the  highest  forms  of  civilization,  so  is 
the  progress  of  each  individual  ever  from  the  lower  to  the  higher.  As 
Israel  went  from  bondage  up  through  the  dispensation  of  legality  to 
usher  in  the  dispensation  of  grace,  so  each  soul  is  led  from  the  bondage 
of  sin  up  past  Sinai,  with  its  thunders  of  "thou  shalt  and  thou  shalt  not;" 
up  to  the  Mount  of  Beatitudes,  with  its  blessings  of  mercy;  up  to  the 
mount  of  transfiguration,  with  its  divine  illuminations  and  heavenly  vis- 
ions; finally  up  the  mount  of  ascension  to  heaven  and  God  and  Christ 
and  the  spirits  of  just  men  made  perfect.  Thitherward  it  is  the  end  and 
aim  of  life  to  climb.  Though  the  acclivities  are  steep  and  rugged;  though, 
on  either  hand,  the  declivities  are  threatening;  though  appetite  and  ease 


294  lifp:  of  president  allen. 

and  emolument  and  ambition  tempt  to  halt  or  turn;  thoui^h  garments  be 
worn  and  ragged,  feet  and  hands  bleeding,  tongue  parched  and  swollen, 
forehead  dripping  with  sweat,  eyes  wet  with  tears,  yet  the  Shekinah 
is  ever  visible  on  the  serene  heights,  and  help  and  consolation  shall  come. 
Hunger  shall  be  satisfied  with  divine  manna,  thirst  slaked  with  waters 
from  the  smitten  rock,  feet  shod  with  sandals  that  wax  not  old.  bodies 
clad  with  vestures  that  fade  nor  fail  not.  As  the  devotees  at  Rome 
climbed  on  their  knees  and  in  prayer  the  stairs  up  which  Jesus  went  to 
his  trial  before  Pilate  and  adown  which  he  returned  the  Great  Con- 
demned, for  the  world's  acquittal,  so  each  Shekinah-legl  soul  must  climb 
the  stairs  of  life,  prayerfully,  tearfully,  yet  which,  like  Jacob's  ladder,  lead 
heavenward,  with  angels  ascending  and  descending,  and  God  standing 
above  to  approve  and  bless. 

The  Shekinah,  in  leading  the  Hebrews,  led  them  in  the  line  of  the 
divine  movements,  and  thereby  they  became  the  forerunners  of  the  high- 
est forms  of  human  progress,  gave  law  and  religion  to  the  world,  and  as 
the  outcome,  modern  civilization,  with  all  its  splendid  achievements.  Blot 
out  the  Hebrews  from  the  world  and  the  highest  results  of  civilization 
will  be  blotted  out.  .So  each  nation  and  individual  who  follow  the  lead 
of  the  Shekinah  have  the  full  assurance  that  they  are  marching  the  same 
way  that  God  is  marching,  and  that  they  will  be  colaborers  with  him  in 
the  furtherance  of  his  ends.  All  toil,  all  sacrifice,  all  minutest  forms  of 
work,  on  this  line,  will  not  be  in  vain.  Each  laborer,  however  humble 
his  lot,  has  the  assurance  that  he  is  working  with  and  for  God.  All 
law,  all  providence  are  his  aids  and  abettors,  and  God  himself  will 
see  that  the  results  are  not  lost,  but  work  together  for  good.  Such  assur- 
ance gives  confidence  and  courage  amid  trial  and  difificulty,  hope  amid 
darkness  and  disappointment.  The  light  of  the  divine  approval  shines 
through  all,  and  makes  all  luminous  and  joyous. 

The  Shekinah-ensphered  and  guided  worker  receives  a  present  and 
glorious  reward  in  his  subjective  culture  and  growth.  Its  indwelling 
light  and  life  are  not  merely  a  reforming,  but  an  informing,  transforming 
power,  configuring  more  and  more  into  the  divine  image,  as  the  years  go 
by,  shining  in  the  countenance,  irradiating  the  eye,  modulating  the  voice, 
and  ennobling  the  whole  bearing  and  deportment.  It  removes  all  stale- 
ness  and  barrenness  from  life,  making  it  fresh,  filling  and  flooding  the  soul 
with  divine  rest,  perpetual  joy,  and  unwearying  vigor.     .     .     . 

The  Shekinah-enfolding,  interpenetrating,  and  transforming  life,  and 
all  of  its  relations  and  activities,  will  enable  one  to  convert  its  longings 
into    a    divine    offering,    holy  and    acceptable.     As    the    Shekinah    fires 


SERMONS.  295 

descended  upon  the  sacrificial  altar  of  Elijah  at  Carmel,  and  converted 
altar,  water,  dust,  into  pure  sacrificial  fire  and  flame,  so  too  in  this  state  of 
attainment,  all  life,  with  its  activities  and  conditions,  will  be  converted  into 
pure  spiritual  flame,  smokeless  and  drossless. 

These  Shekinah-endued  spirits  became  pillars  of  cloud  and  of  fire  to 
the  world.  We  walk  among  men  with  uncovered  head,  recognizing  in 
each  the  divine  image,  though  in  ruins,  yet  grander  in  its  ruins  than  Per- 
sepolis,  Karnak,  or  Parthenon.  When  the  divine  image  has  been  restored 
and  made  glorious  by  the  indwelling  Shekinah,  then  this  sad  respect  is 
changed  to  glad  reverence.  In  ancient  and  medieval  times  the  halo  seen, 
as  a  natural  phenomenon,  encircling  the  human  shadow  upon  the  dewy 
grass,  was  supposed  to  betoken  saintliness.  Hence,  the  old  painters  were 
wont  to  surround  Christ,  the  apostles,  and  eminent  saints  with  a  like 
aureola,  as  emblem  of  the  divine  glory.  Such  a  halo  is,  by  the  eyes  of 
the  Spirit,  seen  encircling  every  saintly  soul  as  it  radiates  the  divine 
glory  in  all  its  living  and  doing.  .  .  .  Life  may  be  a  failure,  as  the . 
world  counts  failure  and  success,  yet  it  may  be  blessed  with  all  the  beati- 
tudes which  Christ  pronounced  upon  the  citizens  of  his  kingdom.  As  the 
dove  descended  upon  Jesus  at  his  baptism,  so  the  Shekinah  descends  upon 
the  regenerate,  dwelling  and  outshining  from  life  and  deed.  The  divine 
glory  manifested  at  the  transfiguration  of  Jesus  was  a  type  of  which  all 
saintly  lives  become  a  faint  expression.  To  each  beholder  such  lives 
become  transcendently  more  beautiful  and  glorious  than  the  beauty  and 
glory  of  landscape,  or  of  the  morning  and  evening  and  the  changing 
seasons,  or  the  beauty  of  the  artistic  devices  of  human  skill.  They 
outrival  the  grandeur  and  sublimity  of  cataract  or  mountain — all  material 
things. 

Young  friends,  you  who  now,  having  completed  the  prescribed  course 
of  college  study,  stand  on  the  threshold,  ready  to  go  out  to  life's  work, 
in  your  respective  missions,  have  higher  privileges,  more  varied  and  rich 
opportunities,  a  more  advanced  position,  than  any  who  have  gone  before. 
The  long  and  weary  way  already  trodden,  the  rugged  heights  already 
gained,  the  achievements  already  won,  are  all  in  your  favor.     .     .     . 

The  great  work  of  evangelizing,  enlightening,  and  civilizing  the  world 
is  yet  in  its  youth.  Humanity  is  just  awakening  from  its  slumbers.  The 
world's  work  is  in  its  early  hours.  The  mists  of  ignorance  are  beginning 
to  leave  the  morning  sky.  The  song  birds  of  promise  are  chanting  their 
matin  hymns.  In  this  morning  light  the  fields  of  labor  stretch  wide  and 
inviting.  The  workers  will  find  vast  and  fertile  fields  still  untouched  by 
the  plowshare  of  culture,  still  unreclaimed  from  barbarism.     There  are 


296  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

greater  conquests  yet  to  be  made  in  the  domain  of  thought  than  ever  was 
made  by  a  Caesar  or  an  Alexander  in  the  domain  of  empire.  The  achieve- 
ments in  these  manifold  fields  will  be  greatly  more  abundant  in  times 
future  than  they  have  been  in  times  past.  Coming  laborers  will  work 
from  higher  vantage  ground  than  past  laborers.  Education  will  have 
more  efficient  agents,  more  ample  means  for  diffusing  its  blessing.s — better 
schools,  larger  funds,  abler  instructors,  increased  number  of  youth— than 
hitherto.  Science  and  art  and  invention  and  discovery  are  to  make  sur- 
passingly greater  conquests.  The  treasures  and  forces  of  nature  are  to 
become  more  and  more  the  servants  of  man.  Reforms  will  battle  more 
effectually  the  mas.sive  and  adamantine  strongholds  of  error  and  wrong. 
Philanthropy  will  relieve  more  completely  human  want  and  woe.  Reli- 
gion will  fill  the  earth  with  its  evangels  of  peace  and  good  will,  bearing 
glad  tidings. 

Go  you  then  forth  into  these  glorious  fields  of  labor  and  of  promise, 
with  an  utter  surrender  of  your  personal  aims  of  life  and  its  ongoings  to 
the  good  guidance  of  the  Shekinah  of  God.  The  perfection  of  your  life- 
work  will  not  consist  in  simple  execution,  not  in  sharpness  of  eye,  dex- 
terity of  hand,  but  in  exaltation  of  aim  and  fervor  of  spirit,  born  of  the 
indwellihg  Shekinah,  whereby  the  dray  carts  of  unfaith  become  changed 
into  the  chariots  of  fire  of  a  living  faith,  and  all  your  life  and  life's  work 
transfigured.  May  the  Shekinah  guard  and  guide  you  up  the  Horeb  of 
life's  divine  call  and  commission;  up  the  Sinai  of  life's  divine  behest  and 
obligation ;  up  the  mount  of  life's  divine  beatitudes  of  mercy  and  forgiv- 
ing grace;  up  the  Hermon  of  life's  divine  transfiguration;  and,  finally, 
when  life's  marches  and  battles  are  ended  and  its  conquests  won,  up  the 
Olivet  of  life's  divine  ascension  to  thrones  of  power  and  glory,  eternal  in 
the  heavens.     Amen. 


SERMONS.  297 


THE    MINISTRY    OF    BEAUTY. 

[Baccalaureate  sermon,  preached  before  the  graduathig  class  of  Alfred  University, 
June  22,  1884.] 
Ps.  90:  17:  "  Let  the  beauty  of  the  Lord  our  God  be  upon  us." 
The  Hebrew  seer  and  Psalmist,  while  comparatively  unmindful  of  the 
beauty  of  the  material  world,  beheld  wondrous  beauty  and  glory  in  the 
Lord,  in  his  goodness,  holiness,  majesty,  and  power,  in  Zion,  the  "per- 
fection of  beauty,"  in  the  services  of  the  sanctuary,  in  the  feet  upon  the 
mountains  that  bring  good  tidings  of  peace,  in  the  meek,  beautified  with 
salvation — in  all  modes  and  manifestations  of  spiritual  beauty. 

JV/ia^,  Then,  Is  Beauty?— \n  the  efforts  that  have  been  made,  through 
the  ages,  to  find  its  nature,  principles,  and  laws,  manifold  are  the  ques- 
tions that  have  arisen,  puzzled,  and  divided  philosophers.  Is  it,  as  held 
by  Plato,  the  first  to  attempt  its  solution,  a  species  of  the  good,  and  a 
branch  of  ethics?  Is  it  grounded  in  unity  and  variety?  Is  its  origin  to 
be  found  in  order  and  regularity,  symmetry  and  proportion  ?  Is  it  in  the 
sentiment  springing  from  association?  Is  it  in  truth  and  genuineness? 
Is  it  in  fitness  and  functional  use?  Is  it  in  the  manifestation  of  the  spirit- 
ual through  the  physical?  Is  it  the  revelation  of  ideal  perfections  in  and 
through  the  finite?  These  are  some  of  the  questions  that  have  graveled 
and  divided  the  students  of  beauty. 

Beauty,  as  we  conceive  it,  is  an  expression  of  the  perfect.  This  man- 
ifestation, when  apprehended  by  man,  awakens  aesthetic  sentiments. 
God  is  perfect.  His  ideals,  laws,  activities  are  all  perfect.  The  manifes- 
tations of  these  perfections,  through  finite  symbols,  constitute  beauty. 
These  perpetually  pervade  the  universe.  Their  grace  configures  all' 
forms.  Their  glory  is  the  sheen  of  all  light  and  color.  Their  harmony 
is  the  music  trembling  round  the  world.  The  train  of  their  holiness 
sweeps  through  the  temple  of  the  universe. 

All  beauty  has  a  divine  and  a  human  side.  This,  again,  is  both  sub- 
iective  and  objective— ideal  and  real.  Ideal  beauty  can  find  expression 
only  in  and  through  realities.  Real  beauty  is  thus  the  manifestation  of 
embodied  ideal  beauty.  The  divine  ideals  partake  of  the  divine  perfec- 
tions; human  ideals  partake  of  human  imperfections.  Realities,  whether 
the  product  of  divine  or  human  power,  partake  of  the  imperfect;  the 
former,  from  the  finite  limitations  imposed  upon  creation,  as  well  as  from 
the  intractableness  of  the  materials  and  opposing  influences;  the  latter, 
from  the  superadded  imperfections  both  of  man's  ideals  and  of  his  activ- 
ities.    Hence,  all  realities  are  of  imperfect  beauty.     Ideal  beauty  is,  not 


298  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

what  is  expressed  in  the  real,  but  what  would  be,  if  the  ideal  could  be 
perfectly  embodied.  Thus  beauty  has  a  threefold  manifestation — the 
divine  ideals,  the  perfect,  human  ideals,  the  imperfect,  and  the  real,  in 
which  these  are  imperfectly  embodied.  This  embodied,  imperfect  beauty 
has,  however,  always  and  everywhere,  the  splendor  of  the  perfect  illumin- 
ing it.  Perfect  beauty  is  the  unobtained,  lying  beyond  the  attained, 
which  the  seeker  is  ever  approaching,  but  never  attaining.      .     .     . 

No  scene  in  nature,  no  work  of  art,  no  music,  oratory,  or  poetry,  no 
deed,  life,  or  character,  is  so  perfect  but  the  imagination,  touched  and 
kindled  by  the  actual,  sees  the  still  more  perfect.  Thus  nothing  is 
truly  beautiful  that  does  not  kindle  the  imagination,  awakening  the  ideal, 
in  which  shines  the  light  of  the  perfect.  All  nature  has  this  trend 
towards  the  higher  and  perfect.  In  this  upward  tendency  the  more 
complex,  differentiated,  and  individualized  each  object  becomes,  the  more 
spiritual  is  the  expression.  From  atom,  fluid,  crystal,  vegetal,  animal,  to 
spirit,  there  is  an  upward  gradiant  and  a  higher  type  of  beauty.  The 
highest  earthly  type  is  in  man,  because  in  him  is  expressed  the  most 
life,  personality,  spirituality.  The  same  holds  in  all  activities  and  arts. 
They  increase  in  beauty  as  they  increase  in  the  capacity  of  expressing 
high  spiritual  sentiments,  and  those  are  the  highest  which  reveal  most 
spirit.  This  is  eminently  true  in  respect  to  that  highest  of  all  life-work, 
that  art  of  arts,  character  making.  Of  all  beautiful  products,  that  of  a 
beautiful  character  stands  preeminent.  As  all  lower  forms  of  physical 
beauty  center  and  culminate  in  man  physical,  so  do  all  spiritual  truths, 
laws,  and  influences,  and  activities  culminate  and  crown  in  character. 

Again,  in  this  ascending  scale,  beauty  is  in  proportion  to  the  expres- 
sion, not  in  individual  peculiarities,  but  of  the  characteristics  of  the  spe- 
cies or  type.  In  proportion  as  an  individual  embodies  and  expresses  in 
himself  the  archetypal  plan  of  the  species,  does  he  rise  in  the  scale  of 
beauty.  Beauty  and  science  thus  have  a  common  root.  When  the  ideal 
type  is  complete  in  the  individual,  perfect  beauty  is  attained.  Thus  was 
Shakespeare  one  of  the  most  intellectually  aesthetic  of  men,  expressing, 
as  he  did,  in  his  many-powered  intellect  not  simply  the  mental  forces  of 
an  individual,  or  age,  or  race,  but  of  all  men  in  all  ages  and  races.  Thus 
was  Pericles  the  most  gracefully  beautiful  of  men.  He  represented  not 
merely  Grecian  grace,  but  human  grace  at  its  best.  Jesus,  the  most 
beautiful  character  of  time,  embodied  in  himself  not  simply  the  moral 
beauty  of  the  Hebrew  character,  but  the  typical,  spiritual  beauty  of 
humanity  in  all  races  and  times  Hence  it  is  that,  both  in  art  and  in  life, 
the    completest    beauty    is    attained    not    by  being    simply    servile    pre- 


SERMONS.  299 

Raphaelistic  copyists  of  an  individual  scene,  or  person,  or  character, 
but  by  selecting  and  combining  the  perfections  of  many,  rejecting  the 
imperfections. 

The  outcome  of  these  principles,  laws,  and  tendencies,  is  an  ascent 
from  the  particular,  accidental,  and  individual,  to  the  generic,  typical,  and 
universal;  from  the  lower  to  the  higher;  from  the  indefinite  to  the  defi- 
nite; from  the  physical  to  the  spiritual;  from  the  real  to  the  ideal;  from 
the  imperfect  tQ  the  perfect.  In  this  realm  is  attained  the  "beauty  of 
holiness,"  the  "perfection  of  beauty."  Here  beauty,  holiness,  perfection, 
are,  at  root,  synonymous  terms.  They  are  simply  different  ways  of  look- 
ing at,  and  different  modes  of  explaining,  the  same  essential  spiritual 
excellency.  As  the  rainbow  unravels  the  three  primary  colors,  with  their 
secondary  modifications,  of  a  beam  of  pure  white  light,  so  these  three 
give  the  essential  elements,  with  their  modifications,  of  complete  spiritual 
worthiness.  The  perfect  is  the  complete;  the  holy  is  the  whole;  the 
healthy,  free  of  all  impurities.  The  beautiful  is  both  completeness  of 
being,  and  its  healthy,  symmetrical,  and  harmonius  activity.  It  has  been 
a  mooted  question  which  is  the  ultimate  end  of  all  spiritul  seeking  and 
endeavor,  the  ultimate  good  of  existence — the  beautiful,  the  holy,  or  perfect. 
That  is  to  say,  should  spiritual  perfection  be  sought  to  the  end  of  getting 
the  "beauty  of  holiness,"  or  holiness  be  sought  to  the  end  of  getting  the 
"perfection  of  beauty,"  or  should  beauty  be  sought  to  the  end  of  getting 
the  holiness  of  perfection  ?  The  importance  of  this  query  fades  away 
when  we  come  to  apprehend  them  as  but  different  manifestations  of  the 
same  essential  attribute.  Then  trinity  becomes  unity;  when  life  is  guided 
by  the  behests  of  law,  then  holiness  gives  light  to  the  vision.  When 
viewed  in  its  ideal  unity,  proportion,  symmetry,  and  harmony,  then  beauty 
fills  the  sight;  when  the  ultimate  attainment  is  considered,  then  perfection 
becomes  the  "light  of  life."  In  short,  no  character  can  be  ideally  beau- 
tiful without  the  holiness  of  perfection,  nor  holy  without  the  "perfection 
of  beauty,"  nor  perfect  without  the  "beauty  of  holiness." 

Be  Ye,  Therefore,  Perfeet  hi  the  Beauty  of  Holiness. — This  is  the  high 
behest  resting  upon  all  spirits.  This  behest  is  heard  in  the  calm,  high 
court  of  conscience,  in  many  voiced  nature,  in  all  noble  lives,  in  all  the 
divine  perfections. 

To  aid  in  the  attainment  of  this  perfection,  all  things  are  to  the  intent 
of  ministries,  workers  together  for  good,  to  man.  Utilities,  truths,  laws, 
joys,  sorrows,  beauty,  religion,  throng  about  him,  standing  as  ministering 
agencies,  appointed  to  his  service.  In  this  ministry  the  lower  is  the 
servant  of  the  higher.     Even  the  earth -bounded  and  life-limited  utilities. 


300  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

food  and  drink,  clothing  and  shelter,  toil  and  rest,  gain  and  loss,  health 
and  sickness,  want  and  wealth,  when  rightly  accepted,  appropriated,  and 
used,  yield  experience,  insight,  patience,  wisdom,  ampler  power,  higher 
character — thus  spiritual  beauty.  Above  these  utilities  there  ever  spans 
the  ideal  life,  to  which  all  things  light  and  lead  the  way.  Fortunate  the 
one  who,  awakening  to  life's  realities,  stands  revealed  to  himself,  over- 
spanned  and  encircled  b}'-  the  ideal  life  of  home,  amid  gentle  domesticities 
and  amenities,  surrounded  by  purity,  peace,  industry,  honesty,  intelligence, 
and  religion,  wherein  are  harmoniously  grouped  and  blended  innocent 
infancy,  ardent  and  aspiring  youth,  earnest  manhood,  silvery  and  patient 
age — all  lighted  and  led  by  high  ideals,  responsive  to  the  awakening 
spirit,  tremulous  with  joy,  singing  as  the  birds  sing,  blooming  in  beauty 
as  do  the  flowers.  The  best  and  the  highest  culture  does  not  come  from 
books  and  schools.  The  amount  of  soulhood  is  not  determined  by 
abstract  knowledge,  but  is  received  and  imparted  as  the  flowers  impart 
odor,  the  sun  light,  all  nature  beauty, — unconsciously. 

Seekest  thou  the  highest  and  the  best?  The  sky  and  flowers  and 
trees  and  birds  can  teach  thee.  Ah!  many  a  man  can  better  be  spared 
from  the  earth  than  such  teachers;  when  the  former  die,  a  great  burden 
is  lifted  from  the  shoulders  of  the  world;  but  when  a  noble  tree  is  slain 
or  a  flower  bed  robbed,  mourners  may  well  walk  the  streets,  for  great 
though  silent  teachers  have  fallen. 

In  this  ministry  each  form  and  mood  is  severally  adapted  to  the 
varying  ages,  moods,  and  stages  of  culture  of  the  recipient  of  the  service. 
In  the  earlier  years  of  life,  before  introspection  begins,  or  the  higher 
teachings  of  the  spiritual  world  are  comprehended,  the  soul  is  open- 
eyed,  receptive,  and  responsive  to  all  that  is  beautiful  in  nature.  This 
is  one  of  the  noblest  and  highest  impulses  of  early  life,  and  one  that  all 
nature  tends  to  foster  and  nurture.  Then  every  tree  and  flower,  every 
sweep  of  meadow  and  woodland,  every  stretch  of  river  and  plain,  every 
tuneful  brook  and  waterfall,  every  expanse  of  ocean  and  sky,  every  day 
and  night  of  glory  or  of  gloom  and  storm,  every  glad  morning  and  quiet 
evening,  throughout  the  varying  seasons — all  give  culture  and  beauty 
to  the  receptive  spirit. 

As  years  increase  and  life  becomes  care-encumbered,  the  outward 
world  is  apt  to  appear  barren  of  all  but  the  utilities;  but  a  soul  true  to 
itself  and  the  divinity  within,  rises  into  the  higher  plane  of  these  min- 
istries. 

The  lower  types  of  beauty  are  preparatory  and  prophetic  of  the 
higher,  and  they  become  helpful   insomuch  as  they  suggest  and  lead  up 


SERMONS.  301 

to  the  higher.  The  artist  catches  these  suggestions  and  seeks  to  retain, 
embody,  and  express  the  higher  beauty  in  painting,  by  color ;  in  plastics, 
by  form;  in  music,  by  sound;  ifi  poetry,  by  word;  in  life,  by  character; 
while  the  divine  artist  uses  all  these,  and  more,  for  the  embodiment  and 
expression  of  his  perfections.  All  nature  is  formful,  voiceful,  and  lifeful, 
with  the  teachings  of  the  divine  Artist,  omnipresent,  as  he  is  omnipresent, 
revealing  to  man  lessons  of  highest  moment.  They  are  all  apostles, 
speaking  to  man  in  diverse  tongues  of  the  divine  glories.  Their  speech 
is  caught  up  and  repeated  by  the  artist.  It  flames  out  in  the  soul  of 
man.  All  forms  of  physical  beauty  find  their  prototype  in  the  soul  of 
man.  He  is  so  constituted  as  to  spontaneously  love  and  appropriate 
beauty  in  whatever  form  manifested.  This  love  is  not  only  a  fine  but  a 
sacred  principle  of  human  nature.  It  comes  as  a  divine  ministry  to  this 
characteristic  of  man.  Its  service  is  to  the  end  of  perfecting  character. 
Its  living  presence,  surpassing  the  most  ideal  forms  ever  composed  by 
man- from  earth's  materials,  waits  upon  our  steps,  a  vision  to  his  "faculty 
divine."     Its  "eternal  chimes" 

"Hush  in  still  communion  that  transcends 
The  imperfect  offices  of  prayer  and  praise, 
The  whole  mind  a  thanksgiving," 

wherein  low  thoughts,  low  desires,  have  no  place,  for  the  minutest  things 
are  lighted  with  the  light  of  infinite  perfections. 

"The  primal  duties  shine  aloft  like  stars; 
The  charities  that  soothe  and  heal  and  bless 
Are  scattered  at  the  feet  of  such  like  flowers." 

Above  these,  new  truths,  great  arts,  sublime  living,  religious  verities, 
touch  the  spirit,  as  live  coals  from  off  the  divine  altar.  When  the  divine 
beatitudes  kindle  and  shine  in  the  higher  life,  then  "be  ye  perfect" 
becomes  both  a  behest  and  an  inspiration.  All  realities  then  become 
ladders  by  which  to  climb  to  the  perfect.  In  this  climbing  the  lower 
forces  die  out,  and  the  higher  become  more  and  more  established. 

"Persons,"  says  Hawthorne,  "who  can  only  be  ornamental,  who  can 
give  the  world  nothing  but  flowers,  should  die  young."  Not  a  few  sons 
and  daughters  of  the  land,  though  they  toil  not,  neither  do  they  spin, 
yet  even  Solomon  in  all  his  glory  was  -not  arrayed  like  one  of  these,  for 
their  fathers  and  mothers  care  for  them — they,  too,  should  die  young. 
All  ornamenters,  merely  for  ornament's  sake,  are  deformities,  and  should 
die  young. 

On  the  other  hand,  all  who,  as  they  grow  old  in  years,  and  objects 
lose  their  freshness,  and  they  their  delicacy  of  perception,  take  on  the 


302  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

higher  and  more  spiritual  beauty,  by  learning,  as  Thoreau  says,  to  "fish 
in  the  skies,  whose  bottom  is  pebbly  with  stars," — such  can  never  grow 
old,  but,  freighted  with  the  divinest  treasures,  they  break  the  sea  of  life 
into  fadeless  beauty  as  they  sail,  thrilling,  enthralling,  and  inspiring  all 
beholders. 

Reverent  and  unfaltering  faith,  and  the  truthful  and  calm  assurance 
springing  therefrom,  is  the  first  essential  element  in  such  living.  The 
calm  vigor  of  a  high  purpose,  the  restful  quietude  of  duty  fulfilled  and 
victory  won,  amid  toil  and  tempest,  are  full  of  divinest  beauty.  A  great 
and  beautiful  soul  is  he  who,  in  calm,  serene  self-poise,  can  keep,  amid 
the  noise  and  bustle  of  the  world,  the  clear  insight  of  solitude,  following 
the  straight  and  high  way,  in  humble  resignation  and  patience,  that  leads 
the  trustful  soul  to  the  presence  of  the  living  God.     .     .     . 

Such  faith  leads  to  the  unselfish  living  born  of  love  and  devotement. 
Many  there  be  who  consider  themselves  umpires  of  taste,  who  prate  of 
elegant  art  and  aesthetic  tastes,  yet,  instead  of  beautiful  souls  and  lives 
with  deeds  like  fair  pictures,  are  selfish  and  low,  and  blur  everything 
lovely  and  noble  with  which  they  come  in  contact.  Many,  like  the  pop- 
lars of  Lombardy,  selfishly  hug  all  their  boughs  about  themselves,  fit 
only  as  a  background  to  all  fair  scenery,  or,  like  those  of  Normandy, 
trimmed  by  the  hand  of  utility  of  all  beauty  for  firewood,  only  a  top  tuft 
of  deformity  left.  Life,  like  art,  to  be  beautiful  must  needs,  while  stand- 
ing centered  and  poised  in  the  strength  of  the  noble  reverence  of  faith, 
have  the  moral  energy  of  unselfish  purposes,  and  the  divine  glory  of 
sacrificial  living. 

A  beautiful  soul  has  beautiful  affinities.  While  the  ugly  assimilate 
what  is  ugly  and  evil  from  all  conditions  of  life,  the  beautiful,  from  the 
same,  get  beautiful  results,  the  fragrance  and  sweetness  of  celestial  flowers. 

As  graciousness  and  tender  forgiveness  is  the  crowning  beauty  of 
the  Lord,  the  crowning  glory  of  his  perfections,  so  are  they  of  the  human. 
When  Jesus  said,  "Be  ye,  therefore,  perfect,  even  as  your  Father  which 
is  in  heaven  is  perfect,"  it  was  to  be  perfect  in  the  perfection  of  his  uncon- 
ditioned graciousness  and  love,  that  made  the  sun  to  rise  on  the  evil  as 
well  as  on  the  good,  and  sent  rain  on  the  just  and  unjust  alike — a  per- 
fection that  would  lead  to  the  love  of  enemies,  the  blessing  of  them  that 
curse,  the  doing  of  good  to  them  that  hate,  and  praying  for  them  that 
despitefully  persecute.  This  is  the  crowning  beauty  of  perfection  and 
the  crowning  perfection  of  beauty.  When  this  is  attained,  it  vitalizes  the 
whole  being,  becoming  formative  of  life,  architectonic  of  character,  mould- 
ing circumstances,  shaping  actions  after   the    divine    type.     True,  such 


SERMONS.  303 

may  not  partake  of  the  so-called  "high  art,"  which,  appealing  chiefly  to 
the  pure  intellect,  is  often  cold,  snowy,  glittering,  doubtless  classical  and 
critical,  perchance  fastidious,  maybe  supercilious,  despising  the  common 
as  unclean,  but  they  partake  of  that  simple  and  gentle  grace  which 
attracts  the  great  tidal  waves,  springing  spontaneously  from  the  common 
joys,  sorrows,  and  aspirations  of  humanity,  and  which  light  up  the 
heavens  with  the  glow  of  a  spiritual  morning. 

"Home,  Sweet  Home,"  not  by  its  "high  art."  but  by  the  tender 
pathos  of  its  sweet  domesticity,  led  the  world  to  stand,  .sympathetically, 
reverently,  with  uncovered  head,  while  the  ashes  of  the  author  are  lifted 
from  their  African  resting  place  and  borne  across  the  ocean  to  their 
American  home,  prepared  by  the  hand  of  friendship. 

John  Brown,  stooping  on  his  way  to  the  gallows  to  kiss  the  negro 
child,  made  the  kinship  of  all  men  to  shine  with  new  tenderness  and 
grace. 

That  Roman  wife  who,  resolving  to  share  the  fate  of  her  husband, 
condemned  to  die  by  his  own  hand,  and,  seeing  him  falter  at  the  fatal 
moment,  took  the  dagger  from  his  trembling  hand,  and,  thrusting  it  into 
her  own  heart,  returned  it,  dripping  with  her  life  blood,  saying,  "  It  does 
not  hurt,"  made  the  world  both  lovelier  and  grander  with  the  heroism 
of  womanly  devotion. 

The  widow's  mite,  by  its  feeble  clink  against  the  heavy  coins  in  the 
treasury,  started  a  melody  which,  trembling  down  the  ages,  has  swelled 
into  a  magnificent  anthem  of  thank  offerings. 

Mary,  breaking  the  alabaster  box,  and  anointing  the  body  of  Jesus 
to  the  burying,  spoiled,  in  the  eyes  of  utility,  the  box  and  wasted  the 
ointment,  costly  and  precious,  but  she  filled  not  only  the  room,  but  the 
world,  with  the  sacred  perfume  of  love. 

Jesus,  saying  to  the  woman,  "Neither  do  I  condemn  thee,"  gave 
highest  proof  of  his  divinity,  and  touched  the  unforgivingness  of  human 
nature  with  the  tenderness  and  compassion  of  the  all-merciful  Father; 
and  when,  on  the  cross,  he  prayed,  "Father,  forgive  them,"  he  set  stream- 
ing from  that  cross  the  glory  of  the  all-forgiving  Father,  to  light  the 
darkness  of  the  world  forevermore. 

Sprinkled  over  the  earth  are  a  multitude  of  spirits  whom  the  beauty 
of  the  Lord  perpetually  overshadows,  making  radiant  their  being,  and 
whose  lives  make  the  world  purer,  sweeter,  more  wholesome,  and  giving 
to  other  lives  a  higher,  more  beautiful,  and  diviner  significance.  They 
may  not  be  cedars  of  Lebanon  or  oaks  of  Bashan,  crowning  the  heights 
of  humanity,  only  simple  violets  or  clover  blossoms,  making  sweet  and 


304  LIFE    OF    PRFSIDENT    ALLEN. 

beautiful  the  highways  and  byways  and  lanes  of  life.  It  may  not  be 
given  them  to  poise  or  sail  on  steady  wing,  like  condor  or  albatross,  in 
the  high  serene  heavens,  or  soar  sunward  as  the  eagle,  or  sing  skyward 
as  the  lark,  but  they  may  be  song  sparrows  or  robins,  furnishing  music 
and  joy  in  multitudes  of  homes.     If,  as  Keats  sings 

"A  thing  of  beauty  is  a  joy  forever," 
much  more  is  a  soul  of  beauty,  however  humble,  both  a  joy  and  an  inspi- 
ration forever. 

The  favorites  of  heaven  are  seldom  the  favorites  of  fortune.  The 
costly  monuments  of  our  cemeteries  are  not  so  much  reminders  of  noble 
lives  as  of  money.  Those  of  the  most  beautiful  lives  may  be  laid  away 
in  the  potter's  field,  devoted  to  the  stranger  and  the  poor,  with  stoneless, 
nameless  graves,  or  graves  whose  inscription  is 

"  Written  with  little  skill  of  song  craft, 
Homely  phrases,  but  each  letter 
Full  of  hope,  and  yet  of  heart-break, 
Full  of  all  the  tender  pathos 
Of  the  here  and  the  hereafter." 

Many  a  life  is  spent  like  the  low-lying  stratus  clouds,  in  the  dull 
everyday  utilities,  perhaps  even  full  of  fog  and  mist  and  sad  Ossianic 
poetry,  but  gradually  rise  a6d  sit,  in  the  evening  of  life,  in  cloud-enthroned 
grandeur,  patriarchs  of  the  heavenly  horizon,  crowned  with  divine  glories 
of  the  "afterglow,"  as  the  fever  heats  of  life  flash,  and  the  darkening 
folds  of  the  coming  night  of  death  gather  about  them. 

All  that  is  fair  and  beautiful,  all  that  is  fine  and  gracious,  in  our  civ- 
ilization, in  which  we  rejoice;  all  that  is  chivalric,  courteous,  unselfish, 
refined,  and  gentle;  all  the  sweet  and  graceful  amenities,  elevated  and 
noble  sentiments;  all  the  religious  aspirations,  benevolent  and  sacrificial 
doing,  have  sprung  from  and  are  the  flowers  and  fruits  of  sublime  faiths, 
patient  and  lowly  labors,  heroic  sacrifices,  and  the  blood  and  ashes  of 
those  who,  amid  the  shock  and  strife,  amid  the  toil  and  sweat  of  every- 
day life,  have  wrought  for  us,  and  whose  fallen  mantles  of  beauty  and  of 
glory  are  to  be  gathered  up  and  worn  by  the  toilers  for  the  future. 

Young  friends,  you  who  during  these  years,  in  these  secluded,  quiet, 
and  beautiful  retreats,  consecrated  to  culture,  have  been  gathering  strength 
of  intellect,  beauty  of  life,  grace  of  character,  are  soon  to  go  forth  to  the 
more  active  participation  in  this  civilization.  Gather  up  these  fallen 
mantles,  and  wear  them  worthily.  Be  true  to  your  youthful  ideals. 
Youth,  and  especially  student  youth,  has  an  ideal  tendency.  Heed  it. 
Cultivate  it.     Be  true  to  it.     Some  poet  has  said: — 


SERMONS.  305 

"  I  remember,  when  I  think, 
That  my  youth  was  half  divine." 

This  high  ideal  tendency  and  aspiration  is  the  crown  of  glory  to 
youth.  Plato,  I  think  it  was,  wished  he  were  the  heavens,  that  he  might 
look  down  upon  his  youthful  students  with  a  thousand  admiring  and 
approving  eyes.  Every  true  teacher  has,  I  apprehend,  a  similar  fueling. 
As  the  artist  seeks  ideal  beauty  in  the  realm  of  material  things,  seek 
ye  it  in  the  realm  of  the  spiritual,  and  express  it  in  your  lives  and  char- 
acters. This  is  the  more  transcendent,  as  spirit  is  more  transcendent  than 
matter.  While  all  purposeless,  inactive  lives  are  inherently  ugly,  all 
girded  loins,  burning  lamps,  and  earnest  endeavor,  however  humble,  are 
beautiful.  When  the  clouds  of  life  gather,  as  they  will,  "hang  them," 
as  one  has  finely  said,  "about  you  with  their  silver  linings  outward,  that 
the  world  may  see  the  true  beauty  that  even  sorrow  can  work  out." 

I  have  attempted  to  show  that  the  highest  quality  of  perfection, 
either  divine  or  human,  is  love,  beneficence,  self-forgetting  ministry.  All 
perfection  in  quality  ever  aspires  to  perfection  in  quantity.  As  the  young 
pine,  though  perfect  in  kind,  climbs  skyward,  till  it  attains  the  full  measure 
of  grace  and  majesty  of  the  mature  tree,  so  let  your  spirits  grow  towards 
absolute  perfection,  or  the  "beauty  of  holiness,"  which,  though  never 
reaching  you,  will  be  ever  approaching.  All  the  realities  of  life  and  of 
eternity  will  furnish  the  ladder  wherewith  to  climb.  And  as  the  "  River 
of  Time"  bears  you  onward — 

"And  the  width  of  the  waters,  the  hush 

Of  the  gray  expanse  where  you  float, 

Freshening  its  current  and  spotted  with  foam 

As  it  draws  to  the  ocean,  may  strike 

Peace  to  the  soul  as  it  floats  on  its  breast 

As  the  pale  waste  widens  around. 

As  the  banks  fade  dimmer  away, 

As  the  stars  come  out,  and  the  night  wind 

Brings  up  the  stream 

Murmurs  and  scents  of  the  infinite  sea," 

may  the  "beauty  of  the  Lord  our  God"  be  upon  you,  and  lighten  this 
infinite  sea  with  "the  glory  of  God,  which  doth  lighten"  the  eternal  and 
beautiful  city,  the  New  Jerusalem.     Amen. 


306  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 


THE    MINISTRY    OF    dOY    AND    SORROW. 

[Baccalaureate  sermon,  delivered  before  the  graduating  class  of  Alfred  University, 
June  21,  1885.] 

"Who  for  the  joy  that  was  set  before  him,  endured  the  cross,  despis- 
ing the  shame,  and  is  set  down  at  the  right  hand  of  God."     Heb.  12:2. 

"God  covers  himself  with  hght,  as  with  a  garment,"  says  the  Psalm- 
ist, and  it  has  been  taught  that  this  light  is  but  "luminous  shadows"  to 
the  ineffable  glory  of  the  Godhead,  becoming  less  luminous  and  more 
shadowy  as  it  streams  outward  and  downward  into  the  lower  and 
grosser  forms  of  the  universe.  The  supernal  joys  that  thrill  beatified 
spirits  are  but  the  luminous  shadows  of  the  perfection  of  holiness,  shad- 
owing down  through  all  the  lower  ranges  of  happiness  and  of  sadness, 
till  they  are  lost  in  the'darkness  and  gloom  of  sorrow.  Wherever  are  the 
perfections  of  holiness,  there  attend,  as  ministries,  the  luminous  shadows 
of  joy;  wherever  are  imperfections  and  sin,  there  attend  the  darkening 
shadows  of  sorrow.  The  music  of  these  joys  is  ever  beating  out  from 
the  divine  perfections  and  flooding  the  universe;  the  moan  of  these  sor- 
rows is  ever  ascending  from  the  realms  of  imperfection  and  sin,  and  beat- 
ing in  sad  waves  around  the  throne  of  compassion  and  love. 

Joy  and  sorrow  spring  from  the  sensibility,  or  the  emotional  and  affec- 
tional  capacity  of  spiritual  natures.  If  spirits  were  pure  intelligences, 
then  a  perpetual  calm  would  reign  in  them.  They  would  reflect  the 
light  of  truth,  unruffled  by  emotion,  unstormed  by  passion.  The  sensi- 
bilities give  capacity  for  pleasure  and  pain,  hope  and  fear,  love  and  hate, 
joy  and  sorrow.  These  are  the  correlate  lights  and  shades  of  life.  The 
pleasures  of  appetite,  the  happiness  from  favoring  fortunes,  the  delights 
of  society,  the  felicity  of  virtuous  living,  the  blessedness  of  benevolence, 
the  joy  of  religion,  the  bliss  of  heaven, — all  have  their  counterparts  in 
pain,  misery,  grief,  sorrow,  and  woe.  They  reciprocally  give  significancy 
each  to  the  other.  No  picture  can  have  body  and  character  without 
shades  as  well  as  lights.  It  takes  not  only  the  sunlight,  but  the  rain 
also,  and  the  blackness  of  the  storm-cloud,  to  give  the  beauty  and  the 
glory  of  the  rainbow.  So,  by  the  reciprocal  action  of  these  correlates 
upon  the  soul,  is  it  ennobled  and  charactered. 

Pleasure,  innate  and  pervasive,  pertains  to  the  very  sense  of  being. 
All  normal  activities  are  a  delight.  In  the  perfection  of  being  and  action, 
every  faculty  sings  in  health,  strength,  and  the  freedom  of  spontaneous 
activity,  yet  through  all  life  there  trembles  a  minor  strain  of  sadness,  or 
a  lower  one  of  sorrow.     Each  flower,  with  its  cup  of  odorous  incense,  as 


SERMONS.  307 

it  glows  and  burns  its  heart  away,  is  charactered  with  sadness  as  well  as 
gladness.  Sad  images  have  pitched  their  tents,  black  as  those  of  Kedar, 
over  all  the  plains  of  night,  beneath  the  sad-eyed  stars  and  the  pallor  of 
the  moon,  crowding  out  into  the  dun  of  ev^ening  and  the  gray  of  morning. 
The  seasons,  even  in  their  most  leafy  and  flowery  and  brightest  hours, 
have  the  tinge  and  tone  of  sadness.  To  the  many-voiced  winds  and 
waters,  man  has  given  melancholy  epithets,  indicative  of  the  responsive 
sadness  which  these  voices  awaken  in  his  soul.  The  great  poets  rise  in 
grandeur  as  they  seek  to  interpret  and  express  this  sadness  which  they 
hear  voicing  itself  in  the  universe. 

Personal  life  begins  and  ends  in  tears.  When  the  soul,  beating  out 
from  oblivion  into  self-consciousness,  all  jubilant  with  young  life,  lighted 
and  lifted  with  hope,  meets  the  stern  realities, — disappointment,  suffer- 
ing, and  death, — prostrating  itself  in  the  agony  of  despair,  it  cries  out, 
"Why  have  I  learned  this?  Nevermore  can  I  be  happy."  And  on, 
through  long  years,  with  the  growing  consciousness  of  these  dread  reali- 
ties, the  soul  beats  about  in  its  cage  of  mortality,  like  some  bird  newly 
caught  from  the  joyful  fields  of  air,  striving  to  find  some  door  ajar,  some 
window  lifted,  through  which  it  may  glide  stealthily  away.  It  is  sad  to 
see  a  young  spirit  slip  the  leash  of  infancy,  and  spring  up  into  childhood 
and  youth,  and  witness  its  consternation  in  the  presence  of  death's  unerr- 
ing archers,  stalking  everywhere,  and  shooting  their  thick-flying  arrows, 
from  which  there  is  no  escape.  To  not  a  few  life  shuts  down  upon  them 
with  a  cold,  dark,  suffocating  pressure,  full  of  despair,  from  which  there 
is  no  release  save  in  the  great  and  final  consummation.'  To  others  days 
come  and  go,  years  slip  by,  youth,  with  its  wistful  longings,  romantic 
dreams,  and  magnificent  outlooks,  hardens  into  the  juiceless  utilities  of 
mature  years,  and  in  the  twilight  of  age  the  murmurs  of  the  infinite  and 
eternal  sea  awaken 

"A  feeling  of  sadness  and  longing. 
That  is  not  akin  to  pain, 
And  resembles  sorrow  only 
As  the  mist  resembles  the  rain." 

In  the  regions  of  the  soul  there  bloom  flowers  more  lovely  than  those 
of  any  springtime;  there  well  waters  more  sparkling  than  those  from 
any  earthly  fountain.  There  are,  likewise,  climes  more  frigid  than 
Labrador,  deserts  more  arid  than  Sahara,  ruins  grander  than  the  Parthe- 
non. Human  history  is  lighted  with  joy.  It  is,  also,  full  of  wail,  beat- 
ing, like  soughing  winds,  up  to  the  mercy  seat.  The  voice  of  man  is  full 
of  tears,  even  while  his  face  is  lighted  with  smiles.  Every  chalice  is 
mixed  with  both  wine  and  gall.     The  heats  of  hell  flame  from  the  same 


308  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

forces  in  the  human  heart  that  Hght  into  the  glory  of  heaven.  Brighter 
the  day  of  joy,  darker  will  be  the  night  of  sorrow,  when  the  sad  moon 
and  the  sadder  stars  die  out,  and  groping  darkness  shuts  down.  The 
deepest  pathos  of  life  is  not  in  its  strife  and  battle,  not  in  its  fiery  fur- 
naces, not  in  storm,  when  great  waves  dash  and  sweep,  but  when  it  sobs 
itself  to  rest,  and  the  waves  of  trouble  sigh  along  the  shore.  Nothing 
short  of  the  infinite  pity  is  sufficient  for  the  infinite  pathos  of  life.  Only 
the  divine  compassion  and  love  can  bestow  the  heavenly  beatitudes 
upon  all  that  are  poor  in  spirit,  all  that  mourn,  all  the  meek,  all  that 
hunger  and  thirst  after  righteousness,  and  cause  all  the  reviled  and  perse- 
cuted to  rejoice  and  be  exceeding  glad.  It  is  this  compassion  that  com- 
missions the  twin  angels  of  joy  and  sorrow  to  walk  the  earth,  hand  in 
hand,  and,  smiling  through  their  tears,  to  mix  the  cup  of  life  with  honey 
and  with  wormwood,  sDber  the  overjoyous,  console  and  gladden  the 
bowed  down  and  broken-hearted. 

Joy  and  sorrow,  in  their  true  nature,  are  spiritual  affections,  subjec- 
tive rather  than  objective,  springing,  not  from  outward  conditions  and 
happenings,  but,  rather,  from  an  internal  set  and  disposition  of  the  spirit. 
Joy,  in  this  higher  sense,  is  the  fruit  of  the  Spirit,  the  fire  of  faith,  the 
light  of  love,  the  music  of  high  spiritual  activities.  Wherever  there  is 
truth,  and  beauty,  and  love,  and  reverence,  and  renunciation,  and  sacrifice, 
there  is  joy.     Where  there  is  a  want  of  these,  there  is  sorrow. 

A  feeble  painter  deals  daintily  with  the  lights  and  shades  of  his  picture, 
but  a  master  puts  them  in  with  strong,  bold  touches,  especially  when  he 
wishes  to  portray  great  scenes  or  masterful  characters.  Thus^  likewise, 
when  God  desires  to  give  the  world  a  great  life  and  character,  he  deals  the 
lights  and  shades  of  joy  and  sorrow  with  a  free  hand.  Every  great  soul 
has  its  Gethsemanes  and  its  Calvaries,  as  well  as  its  mounts  of  beatitudes 
and  transfiguration.  The  common  life  is  pale  and  bloodless;  but  joy 
and  sorrow  give  fuller  and  deeper  experiences  and  a  more  sacred  mean- 
ing to  life.  The  soul  upon  which  the  barrenness  of  life  has  wrought  its 
influence  is  apt  to  become  irritable  and  peevish,  losing  all  composure 
and  dignity  of  spirit;  but  he  who  suffers  patiently  and  calmly,  smiling 
through  his  tears,  touches  the  tenderest  and  most  responsive  chords  of 
human  sympathy.  When  the  garden  of  life  becomes  a  desert,  with  no 
blossoms  of  hope,  no  song  birds  of  requited  love  and  sacrifice,  even  then 
the  soul  that  silently,  patiently,  bears  its  unvoiced  sorrows  unto  the  end, 
when  life  has  only  woes,  shall  God's  comfort  know.  This  humble  gen- 
tleness is  divine  greatness,  therefore  let  patience  have  her  perfect  work. 
Then  will  the  soul  which  before  had  no  hope,  no  aspiration,  no  endeavor^ 


SERMONS.  309 

be  lifted  by  the  divine  Comforter  into  a  realm  of  joyful  living  and  doing. 
.  .  Power  is  measured,  not  alone  by  what  we  bravely  do,  but,  very 
especially,  by  what  we  patiently  endure.  To  be  cool  and  quiet  when 
provocation  comes,  and  the  natural  impulses  burn  with  a  fierce  heat,  to 
be  serene  amid  trouble  and  disappointment, — these  are  the  tests  of  true 
greatness  and  spiritual  power.  The  disciplines  of  poverty,  losses,  dan- 
gers, sickness,  trials,  temptations,  bereavements,  treacheries,  desertions, 
ridicules,  persecutions,  when  rightly  received,  appropriated,  and  used,  are 
all  purifying,  refining  agencies.  The  sweetest  joys  are  drawn  from  the 
bitterness  of  life,  from  suffering  and  sorrow  overcome.  We  most  prize 
those  spirits  who  can  bear  misfortune  with  an  equable  mind,  whose  forti- 
tude shines  through  and  disperses  the  clouds  of  sorrow.     .     .     . 

In  order  that  joy  and  sorrow  may  perform  their  true  offices  as  minis- 
tries to  spiritual  perfection,  there  must  be  some  end  to  be  sought  worthy 
to  engage,  control,  and  guide  all  the  activities  of  life.  Otherwise,  man  is 
like  a  becalmed  ship,  with  useless  rudder,  and  compass,  and  sail,  drifting 
at  the  mercy  of  wave  and  tide;  but  with  right  aim  and  sufficient  motive 
he  becomes  self-propelled  and  self-guided. 

What  can  be  such  an  aim,  giving  such  a  motive?  Is  it  seeking  to 
make  prevail  civil  rights  and  political  sovereignty;  the  will  and  law  of 
God  which  makes  for  righteousness;  the  universal  truth,  fitness,  and 
beauty  of  things;  the  highest  univ^ersal  happiness  either  here  or  hereafter, 
or  both  here  and  hereafter;  the  right  reciprocal  sympathy  of  all  beings; 
or  obeying  the  sense  of  oughtness,  awakened  by  the  intuitive  apprehen- 
sion of  right  and  wrong?  Are  any  or  all  of  these  and  kindred  theories 
of  philosophers  and  theologians  the  true  and  ultimate  end? 

Is  not  the  ultimate  and  supreme  end  rather  that  which  is  inclusive  of 
all  these  as  means  and  ministries?  Can  the  end  of  human  endeavor  be 
other  than  that  which  God  and  all  divine  agencies  are  seeking  ?  God  so 
loved  the  world  that  he  gave  his  Son  for  its  redemption  from  sin  and 
restoration  to  holiness.  This  was  the  joy  set  before  Christ  in  his  mission, 
and  this  joy  was  so  great  as  to  enable  him  to  endure  the  cross,  despising 
the  shame.  Christ's  mission,  therefore,  was  not  primarily  to  make  men 
happy,  now  or  hereafter,  but  to  make  them  holy,  of  which  joy  is  the 
"  luminous  shadow."  To  this  same  end  all  divine  agencies  and  ministries 
are  working.  The  apostle  further  on  tells  us  that  all  chastening  is  to 
this  same  end, — of  making  the  Christed  ones  partakers  of  the  divine 
holiness. 

Can  the  ultimate  aim  of  man  be  other  than  this  ?  Anything  different 
or  lower  is  insufficient  to  meet  all   the  conditions  for  making  both  jo}' 


3IO 


LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 


and  sorrow  perpetual  ministries  for  good.  All  lower  aims,  late  or  soon, 
pall  upon  the  unsatisfied  spirit,  leaving  it  aching  and  restless.  When, 
however,  one  has  set  for  himself  as  the  highest  and  all-comprehending 
purpose  of  life  to  make  the  beauty  of  holiness  prevail  more  and  more, 
both  in  himself  and  in  all  others,  to  make  the  beauty  of  perfection  pre- 
vail more  and  more  in  all  the  works  of  God,  then  he  becomes  a  colaborer 
with  God  and  all  divine  agencies.  He  then  has  an  aim  sufficiently 
exalted,  pervasive,  and  enduringly  motived  to  awaken  the  loftiest  aspira- 
tions, enkindle  the  noblest  enthusiasms,  quicken  and  sustain  the  most 
sacrificial  endeavors.  It  will  enable  him  to  use  all  talent,  all  opportunity, 
all  pains  and  pleasures,  endure  all  crosses,  despising  the  shames — make 
everything,  in  short,  work  together  as  ministries  for  good. 

Thus  living  and  acting  in  unison  with  God,  and  for  the  same  end  as 
that  for  which  all  of  his  ministers  and  ministries  of  grace  are  working, 
will  give  deific  living.  Such  spirits  walk  the  loftiest  planes  of  life,  soli- 
tary and  alone  it  may  be,  compassed  about  and  pressed  with  clouds  that 
flash  and  pour,  yet  through  the  joy  that  is  set  before  them  in  this  divine 
aim  they  become  in  all  life's  conflicts  more  than  conquerors. 

Where  the  supreme  aim  is,  there  also  will  be  the  supreme  love,  faith, 
and  hope,  carrying  in  their  train  supreme  joys  and  sorrows.  If  making 
holiness  prevail  be  this  aim,  then  will  this  supreme  love  go  out  conse- 
cratedly,  sacrificially,  joyfully  to  the  same  end.  The  forgiving  and  wait- 
ing God,  waiting  and  seeking  to  be  gracious,  sent  his  Son  to  manifest 
this  gracious  love  by  a  self-abnegating,  sacrificial  life  and  death.  This  is 
the  greatest  power  in  heaven  and  on  earth — the  most  fruitful  of  bless- 
ings and  blessedness.  The  sublimest  joy  known  springs  from  such  love 
suffering  unselfishly  for  another,  from  that  love  which  does  not  feel  or 
act  for  self,  but  takes  to  itself  gladly  another's  sorrow,  suffers  in  another's 
stead,  that  not  simply  gives  love  for  love,  but  gives  love  for  indifference, 
hate.  Sacrificial  living  and  dying  are  the  ultimate  test  of  the  genuine- 
ness of  love.     Great  sorrow  springs  from  the  same  source. 

The  Man  of  Sorrows,  despised  and  rejected  of  men,  bore  our  griefs, 
carried  our  sorrows,  was  wounded  for  our  transgressions,  bruised  for  our 
iniquities,  afflicted,  oppressed,  chastised  for  our  healing  and  peace,  pour- 
ing out  his  soul  unto  death,  in  bearing  our  sins.  He  was  made  perfect 
through  obedience  and  suffering,  becoming  the  Author  of  eternal  salva- 
tion unto  all  who  obey  him,  and  shall  bring  many  sons  unto  glory. 
This  is  his  joy  as,  seated  at  the  right  hand  of  God,  and  bending  down 
and  overleaning  the  drooping  spirit  in  each  saddest,  keenest  lesson  of 
life,  he  lifts  up  and  consoles.  His  throne  is  a  throne  of  patience  and 
all-sufferincr  love. 


SERMONS.  311 

When  one,  partaking  of  the  spirit  of  the  Man  of  Sorrows,  has  pressed 
with  pain  of  heart  and  weary  toil  of  bruised  feet  through  the  long,  dark 
way  of  grief  upward  to  the  light,  and  has  prevailed;  when  he  has  been 
subdued  and  softened  in  the  silences  and  mysterious  shadows  of  great 
sorrows,  and  made  full  of  deep  and  broad  sympathies ;  when  he  has  been 
chastened  and  refined  into  deep  tenderness,  and  solemn  consecrations, 
and  all-embracing  compassions — then  is  he  prepared  to  touch  the  barren- 
ness of  common  lives  with  accordant  sympathies  and  impulses,  that  shall 
lead  to  glad  service,  by  patiently  standing  and  waiting,  or  by  going  to  all 
beneficent  and  sacrificial  work. 

Sympathy  is  love  responsive  to  another's  condition,  joying  with  the 
rejoicing,  sorrowing  with  the  sorrowing.  Whatever  joy  or  sorrow  throbs 
in  another's  heart  throbs  in  its  own.  Blessed,  indeed,  is  the  sympathiz- 
ing friend  who  inspires,  but  more  blessed  is  the  friend  who  consoles.  In 
order  to  become  the  consoling  friend,  one  must  needs  to  have  been  himself 
consoled,  and  thus  be  enabled  to  give  tender  and  responsive  sympathies. 
Whoever  has  passed  through  the  fiery  furnace  of  affliction  and  persecu- 
tion, guided  and  consoled  by  the  presence  of  the  Fourth,  is  thus  prepared 
to  counsel  and  console  others  as  they  pass.  As  the  darkness  of  night 
reveals  astronomic  grandnessand  starry  glories,  undreamed  of  in  thelight 
of  day,  so  he  who  has  had  his  spiritual  vision  rendered  clairvoyant  in 
nights  of  doubt  and  trial,  is  thereby  enabled  to  make  known  to  others 
the  glories  revealed  by  faith  and  hope,  undreamed  of  in  the  light  of  com- 
mon things  and  common  experiences. 

In  the  beautiful  vernacular  dialect  in  which  Christ  and  his  disciples 
and  the  common  people  spoke,  Saviour  meant  the  life  giver,  the  healer, 
giving  both  physical  and  spiritual  life  and  health.  So,  likewise,  all  who 
have  been  made  partakers  of  this  saving  life  and  health,  and  have  been 
purified  and  strengthened  thereby,  become  co-healers  and  helpers  with 
Christ.  The  High  Priest  of  humanity,  touched  with  feeling  for  its 
infirmities,  comes  to  the  humble  and  contrite,  and  dwells  in  the  broken  in 
spirit,  bringing  strength  to  weaknesses  and  wants,  consolations  to  all 
frets  and  troubles  of  life.  This  infinite  goodness  .springs  from  infinite 
love.  This  is  the  healing  and  helpful  power  of  goodness — remedial  to 
all  afflictions  of  the  spirit.  The  power  and  might  of  God  trod  the  earth 
in  the  person  of  his  Son;  so  did  the  gentleness  of  God.  Son  of  God  and 
Son  of  man,  he  was  at  once  the  mightiest,  most  heroic,  and  the  gentlest, 
glorified  by  all  heavenly  power,  yet  touched  by  all  human  infirmities. 
Gentleness  is  power  moved  by  love,  toned  by  tenderness.  The  great  and 
most  heroic — most  empowered  with  manly   vigor — when   touched  and 


312  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

toned  by  sympathy,  are  ever  the  gentlest  amid  suffering  and  sorrow. 
Such  administer  oil  and  balm  with  the  most  deftly  gentle  hand.  Thus 
do  all  Christed  souls,  empowered  with  his  power,  and  coming  up  from 
the  baptism  of  Christly  sorrow,  thereby  made  gentle  with  his  gentleness, 
sympathetic  with  his  sympathy,  go  forth  spontaneously  as  healers  and 
helpers.  The  helpful,  healing  power  of  love,  sympathy,  and  gentleness, 
though  very  quiet,  is  yet  a  very  effective  power  in  the  world.  All  great 
forces  are  silent  in  their  operations.  No  one  hears  the  tramp  of  gravita- 
tion, or  the  dews  fall,  or  the  grass  and  the  trees  grow.  The  silent  cur- 
rents of  electricity  that  ceaselessly  flow  through  and  around  the  world 
are  infinitely  more  potent  than  its  flash  in  the  lightning  or  crash  in  the 
thunderbolt.  So  the  silent,  unconscious,  yet  healing  and  helpmg  influ- 
ences that  perpetually  stream  out  from  lives  charactered  in  goodness,  are 
transcendentally  more  potent  than  all  forceful  efforts  put  forth  to  the 
same  end.     .     . 

The  legitimate  though  supplemental  outflow  of  these  silent  agencies 
is  a  set  and  voluntary  effort,  both  individual  and  associated,  for  the  good 
of  others;  hence  the  various  agencies  of  benevolence  as  aids  to  the  bet- 
tering of  man's  condition  both  here  and  hereafter.  The  best  evangels, 
teachers,  preachers,  pastors,  missionaries,  organizers,  and  conductors  in 
these  voluntary  efforts  are  they  who  are  deeply  experienced  and  richly 
charactered  in  these  passive  and  submissive  virtues  and  in  the  spiritual 
graces  springing  from  them.  In  the  future  high  reaches  of  religious 
culture  and  Christian  civilization,  when  the  gentleness  of  God  and  the 
patience  of  Jesus  come  more  and  more  to  prevail  among  men,  then  will 
these  higher  Christian  graces  have  greater  significance  and  wider  sway. 

Woman,  being  more  richly  endowed  and  more  especially  given  to  the 
culture  of  these  graces  than  man,  will  then  come  to  her  full  inheritance, 
dominion,  and  influence.  Man,  being  of  a  coarser  and  more  rugged 
spiritual  fiber,  can  never  lead  up  the  heights  of  these  finer  and  diviner 
graces.  Where  man  falters  and  fails,  woman  must  take  up  and  lead  on 
to  regions  where  reign  the  saintly  graces  of  love,  sympathy,  gentleness, 
tenderness,  and  all-consoling  and  all-healing  helpfulness. 

Young  friends,  you  are  soon  to  go  forth  into  the  world,  with  its 
mingled  faiths  and  doubts,  hopes  and  fears,  loves  and  hates,  joys  and  sor- 
rows. Some  of  you  have  consecrated  your  lives  to  the  sacred  work  of 
proclaiming  glad  tidings  of  peace  and  goodwill  to  men — one  being  of  the 
sisterhood  of  those  who  were  last  at  the  cross  and  first  at  the  sepulcher, 
and  first  to  publish  the  joyful  tidings  of  a  risen  Saviour.  It  becomes  her 
with  especial  ajipropriateness,  what  becomes  you  all,  to  inaugurate  your 


SERMONS.  313 

respective  life  missions  with  blessings.  Go  not  as  negative,  misanthropic, 
destructive- forces,  but  as  positive,  philanthropic,  up-building  forces.  Go 
consoling,  healing,  strengthening,  persuading,  organizing,  establishing. 
Be  helpers  in  making  prevail  whatever  is  true,  and  beautiful,  and  good. 
Seek  to  awaken  high  aims,  and  to  inspire  to  noble  living.  Let  generous, 
forgiving,  life-giving  sentiments  and  sympathies  beat  out  into  all  interests 
affecting  the  well-being  of  man,  sweetening  all  the  fountains  of  life.  Let 
your  lives  be  examples  of  self-forgetting,  sacrificial  living,  and,  if  need  be, 
of  sacrificial  dying. 

As  life  advances  and  age  comes  on,  and  the  heat,  and  drive,  and  strife, 
with  their  sharp  pangs  of  griefs  and  noisy  exultations  of  life,  are  over,  its 
pathway,  if  it  has  been  beautifully  lived,  becomes  fringed  with  the  ripest 
fruits  of  peace  and  resignation.  Life's  unfathomed  ocean  of  mystery, 
sadness,  and  unrest,  with  its  days  of  gray  fog  and  dull,  heavy  clouds, 
shrouding  all  its  headlands,  and  shutting  out  all  broad  and  elevated  views, 
are  transformed  and  glorified  by  clearer  lights  and  softer  airs.  Life's 
sun  has  no  longer  a  scorching  fierceness,  but  its  days,  mild  and  calm, 
glide  gently  by.  The  bright  clouds  of  life's  morning  enfold  the  brow 
with  their  thin,  silvery  mists.  Memories,  floating  lightly  as  thistledown 
through  the  mental  atmosphere,  strained  of  all  harsh  and  discordant 
notes,  pulse  in  subdued  minor  strains  upon  the  soul,  and  all  things  con- 
spire, through  their  message  of  tenderness  and  love,  to  ripen  the  fairer 
and  diviner  graces  of  the  spirit.  The  feet  that  have  climbed  toilsomely 
towards  eternity  find  stones  in  their  pathway  transformed  to  shining 
stairs,  and  the  entangling  weeds  bloom  in  celestial  beauty  and  fragrance. 
Bitter  fountains  are  rendered  sweet,  and  the  crumbs  of  common  fare  are 
changed  to  heavenly  manna.  Earthly  affinities  are  reduced  to  gossamer 
threads,  holding  lighdy  to  earth,  and  the  low  desire  of  living  for  living's 
sake  dies  out,  and  the  love  of  life  and  the  fear  of  death  become  trans- 
formed with  hope  of  life  eternal.  The  New  Jerusalem  is  no  longer  a  far- 
away and  strange  city,  with  no  acquaintance  there,  but  its  foundations 
rest  on  all  the  hills  of  life,  and  its  walls  blend  with  the  spiritual  horizon. 
The  murmur  of  the  river  of  living  waters  fills  the  ear,  while  foretastes  of 
the  tree  of  life  refresh  the  spirit,  and  foregleams  of  heavenly  glories 
light  the  tired  traveler  heavenward,  where  there  shall  be  no  more  death, 
neither  sorrow  nor  pain,  for  the  former  things  have  passed  away,  and  all 
become  new.     .     .     . 


314  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 


THE   IDEAL  GOLLEGE-A   LIGHT. 

[Baccalaureate  sermon,  June  27,  1886.] 

"  Let  there  be  light."     Gen.  i  :  3. 

Within  this  quiet  valley,  shut  in  by  these  circling  hills,  seated  on  their 
rock}'  thrones,  as  perpetual  guards  against  the  noise  and  strife  of  the 
driving  world,  we  gather  to  inaugurate  the  golden  anniversary  of  our 
Alma  Mater,  who  has  cherished  us,  in  successive  generations,  as  for  the 
last  fifty  years  we  have  gathered  around  her  hearthstone.  Her  good 
genius  presides  over  the  occasion,  and,  by  the  aid  of  memory  and  associa- 
tion, lifts  the  trivial  and  the  common  into  dignity  and  importance,  casting 
over  all  a  glory  otherwise  unseen,  thus  awakening  teeming  emotions  and 
stirring  inspirations.  It  is  an  epoch  at  which  we  instinctively  pause,  and 
reverently  brush  away  the  gathering  dust  and  growing  moss  from  the 
fast-fading  records  of  other  days,  that  we  may  read  and  interpret  their 
teachings.     .     .     . 

Year  by  year  for  the  last  fifty  years  we  have  gone  from  here,  gone  in 
youth,  filled  with  the  romantic  thoughts  of  the  untried  future  opening 
before  us.  Time  has  passed.  Many  and  stirring  events  have  transpired. 
The  leaves  and  blossoms  of  youth  have  given  place  to  the  fruits  of  mature 
and  active  life,  and  we  are  reaping  the  harvests  of  seed  sown  here.  Some 
of  us  return,  sobered  by  age,  ripened  by  experience,  saddened  and  sub- 
dued by  trial  and  sorrow.  Our  ranks  are  thinning,  the  members  falling, 
one  by  one,  like  the  leaves  of  the  forest,  each  to  his  resting  place,  while 
our  Alma  Mater  stands  like  the  trees  of  this  forest,  renewing  and  enlarg- 
ing her  life  year  by  year,  with  ever-increasing  growth,  strength,  and 
beauty.     All  to  what  end? 

'■'Let  there  be  light"  was  deemed  the  most  suitable  legend  for  the  offi- 
cial seal  of  this  University,  as  expressive  of  its  aim  and  high  mission. 
The  increase  of  light,  the  especial  mission  of  the  ideal  college,  seems  a 
most  fitting  theme  for  inaugurating  these  jubilee  exercises. 

Deity,  in  speaking  -light  into  existence,  created  the  fittest  emblem  of 
himself,  who  is  light,  and  dwelling  in  light  unapproachable.  As  Deity 
fills  all  space  and  permeates  all  matter  with  this  light  ether,  and  trans- 
mutes it  into  heat,  light,  electricity,  and  gravitation,  by  it  scatters  dark- 
ness, and  gathers  and  globes  atoms  into  worlds,  refreshes  the  barren  earth 
with  showers,  covers  it  with  beauty,  and  peoples  it  with  life,  thus  trans- 
forming chaos  into  cosmos,  so  does  the  light  of  divine  wisdom  permeate 
and  fill  all,  scatter  mental  darkness,  build  truth  into  systems  of  order,, 
harmony,  and  beauty.     .     .     .- 


SER?>IONS.  315 

As  the  eye  is  the  organ  for  gathering  in  physical  hght,  for  bodily  uses, 
so  the  reason  is  the  organ  for  gathering  in  the  light  of  truth,  for  mental 
uses.  The  spirit's  need  of  light  is  far  higher  and  more  imperative  than 
the  body's  need.  The  soul  sits,  Memnon-like,  with  silent,  eastward  gaze, 
waiting  for  the  dawn  of  truth  to  awaken  its  dormant  melodies  into  songs 
of  joyous  activity.  The  mind,  in  such  need,  on  receiving  the  intuitive 
truths  flashing  upon  it  with  the  self-attesting  powers  of  sunlight,  per- 
ceives the  divine  plan  running  through  and  shaping  all  into  organic  unity, 
and  philosophy  is  born.     ... 

The  college  is  one  of  the  highest  of  the  institutional  inventions,  from 
which  have  descended  all  lower  educational  institutions.  As  the  sun 
gathers  and  intensifies  light,  for  lighting  its  dependent,  planetary  worlds, 
so  the  special  function  of  the  college  is  to  ingather  and  intensify  the  light 
of  truth,  for  lighting  all  other  institutions  and  enterprises.  Truth,  like 
the  world  of  life,  is  one  organic,  symmetrical  whole,  connecting  back  to  a 
common  source,  Deity;  so  a  college  should  be  a  center,  representing 
truth  in  its  organic  unity  and  completeness,  and  thus  sending  it  out  in 
ever-widening  circles  of  light  and  influences. 

To  this  end  the  college  must  ever  stand  high  above  all  those  influ- 
ences of  the  world  that  militate  against  the  truth;  above  the  sway  of 
great  names  around  which  lesser  lights  revolve,  not  always  from  the 
attractions  of  pure  truth,  but  because  of  size  and  brilliancy,  or,  like  the 
lamplight,  dazzling  the  mental  miller  out  of  the  darkness,  to  flutter  and 
singe  and  die  in  its  blaze;  stand  above  the  fogs  and  mists  of  narrow  par- 
tisanships and  passions  of  popular  prejudice,  that  lead  the  unthinking 
multitude  blindly  to  approve,  or  as  blindly  to  condemn.     .      .     . 

The  ideal  college  produces  growth.  As  the  sunlight  is,  by  the  subtile 
alchemy  of  life,  converted  into  growth,  in  the  vegetable  kingdom,  every 
plant  after  its  species,  and  this  life  growth  is  transformed,  in  the  animal 
kingdom,  into  higher  modes  and  kinds,  so  the  college  is  to  furnish  the 
light  of  truth,  to  the  end  of  being  converted  into  mind  growth.  Each 
individual  being  a  receptive  and  transmuting  agency  of  this  light,  a  col- 
lege becomes  a  center  for  gathering  it  for  the  benefit  of  many.  This  con- 
centration and  increase,  together  with  the  reciprocally  stimulating  and 
invigorating  influence  of  mind  upon  mind,  and  its  pervading  spirit,  greatly 
enhances  the  power  of  a  college.  This  power  operates  in  youth,  the 
period,  if  ever,  of  high  ideals.  .  .  .  The  college,  therefore,  should 
not  foster  the  absorptive  capacities  of  the  mind,  -by  cramming  it  with 
piles  of  "learned  lumber,"  nor  spiritless,  mechanical,  perfunctory  routine, 
nor  muscle  at  the  expense  of  brain,  nor  h\'percritical   refinements  at  the 


3l6  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

expense  of  manhood,  but  foster,  rather,  spontaneity,  freshness,  freedom, 
originaUty,  and  independent  thought  and  investigation,  comprehensive 
views,  a  respect  for  ideas,  a  scholarly  enthusiasm,  responsive  to  the  teach- 
ings of  the  most  gifted  minds  in  all  ages,  an  ethical  worthiness  and  spir- 
itual dignity,  and  a  reverent  theistic  temper,  based  on  a  calture  that 
organizes  and  develops  all  into  character.  As  the  single  airs  in  music 
are  woven  by  the  skilled  musician  into  strains  that  touch  the  deepest 
chords  of  the  heart,  so  should  the  college  weave  the  simple  elements  of 
knowledge  into  systems  of  culture  that  shall  touch  all  the  springs  of 
action,  awaken  all  the  powers  of  the  mind,  and  thus  become  a  source  of 
ever  fresh,  free,  and  invigorating  thought  and  inspiration,  begetting  higher 
aspirations,  leading  to  better  purposes,  nobler  endeavors,  and  greater 
achievements.  If  these  manifold  good  influences  have  their  legitimate 
effect,  all  the  latent  energies  of  the  higher  nature  will  be  vitalized,  new 
powers  unfolded,  clearer  insight,  finer  tastes,  deeper  and  wider  sympathies 
cultured,  and  a  growth  secured,  beautiful  and  strong. 

Again,  a  college  should  seek,  as  its  highest  end,  to  give  a  culture 
whose  growth  is  Godward.  As  to  all  others,  so  to  the  student  and  the 
college  the  most  important  subject  is  religion.  What  the  eye  is  to  the 
body,  religion  is  to  learning.  As  the  body  is  ennobled  by  the  spirit,  so 
is  learning  by  religion.  To  carefully  train  the  lower  faculties,  while  the 
higher  lie  neglected  and  dormant,  to  give  intellectual  strength  without, 
at  the  same  time,  securing  spirit-life  and  spirit-growth,  is  to  fail  in  the 
highest  and  best  culture,  making  life  ignoble  and  learning  a  blind  Samson, 
grinding  at  the  mills  of  the  Philistines.  Mental  activities  grow  normally 
upward  into  moral  atmospheres  and  spiritual  lights.     .     .     . 

The  college  student  is,  consciously  or  unconsciously,  passing  a  most 
critical  as  well  as  a  most  important  period  of  his  life.  He  is  surrounded 
by  pervading  influences  so  subtile  yet  so  potent  that  the  most  silent  and 
secret  may  .start  forces  as  unending  as  the  spirit  itself  He  is  both 
receiving  and  exerting  these  influences,  greater  and  more  lasting  than  in 
any  after  years  or  in  any  other  spheres.  He  is  also  deciding  questions 
that  can  never  be  redecided,  determining  courses  of  action  that  can  never 
be  redetermined.  The  college  youth  is  presumed,  from  his  very  pursuits, 
to  have  become  awakened  to  a  consciousness  of  his  powers,  possibilities, 
and  responsibilities,  and  to  aspirations  and  purposes  that  lift  above  the 
plane  of  appetite  and  animal  living,  into  the  realm  of  spiritual  worth  and 
manly  endeavor.  The  measure  of  this  consciousness  is  the  measure  of 
his  conscious  manhood.     .     .     . 

Again,  an  ideal   college  should  be  a  source  of  progress  and  civiliza- 


SERMONS. 


317 


tion.  As  cephalization,  or  head  dominion,  determines  the  grade  of 
species,  in  the  ascending  scale  of  the  animal  kingdom,  so  the  college, 
representing  the  highest  mental  life,  determines  the  head  dominion  of  a 
people.  As  fast  as  man  becomes  disenthralled,  and  begins  to  think, 
believe,  and  act,  individual  life  begins  to  aggregate,  combine  into  public 
life,  and  thought  organize  into  institutional  thought.  In  the  college  this 
is  segregated,  combined,  intensified,  and  perpetuated.  The  college  thus 
becomes  a  brain  center,  whence  ramify  the  mental  nerves,  diffusing 
thought  through  the  social,  public,  and  institutional  life.  It  attracts,  as  a 
general  rule,  the  best  minds  from  all  classes,  those  who  are  to  fill  places 
of  trust,  influence,  and  power,  and  it  should  send  them  forth  bearing  the 
light  of  highest  progress  and  most  advanced  civilization.      .     .     . 

Without  the  desire  for  the  acquisition  and  use  of  truth,  both  old  and 
new,  no  progress  can  be  made,  but  immobility  or  decay  sets  in.  Parties 
and  sects,  with  their  platforms  and  creeds,  have  accepted  and  appi'o- 
priated  certain  truths,  or  half-truths,  mingled,  it  may  be,  more  or  less, 
with  error,  with  which  they  are  satisfied,  hence  they  become  stereotyped, 
fossilized.  Seldom  are  individuals,  parties,  or  sects,  progressive  beyond 
their  youthful  days;  seldom  are  they  good  for  more  than  one  leading 
truth.  When  they  have  blossomed  and  fruited  once,  and  years  increase, 
their  seeking  and  their  progress  cease,  and  fossilization  or  a  vegetative 
decay  sets  in,  thus  becoming  fine  scientific  illustrations  of  arrested  devel- 
opment. "  Let  the  dead  bury  their  dead."  The  world  has  no  farther 
use  for  them.      Cumberers  of  the  highway  of  progress  are  they. 

The  ideal  college  must  be  so  constituted  and  conducted  as  to  admit 
new  truths  and  their  utilization,  or,  however  perfect  at  first,  it  too  will 
in  time  become  incrusted  with  routine,  followed  by  petrifaction  or  decay. 
If  it  shall  say,  "The  old  is  good  enough;  let  us  not  seek  for  a  better,  le.st 
a  worse  befall,"  the  spirit  of  progress  will  ever  reply,  "The  old  may  have 
been  good  once,  but  it  is  no  longer  entirely  good — a  better  has  come." 

As  the  earth  has  been  built  up  layer  upon  layer,  the  older  serving  as 
foundations  for  the  newer  and  higher,  so  the  college  should  rest  upon 
old  truths  as  permanent  substrata  for  the  new.  It  should  be  the  embodi- 
ment of  all  truth,  both,  old  and  new,  and  of  the  achievements  of  all 
progress,  and  send  these  forth  to  be  wrought  into  still  better  methods, 
systems,  and  institutions.  If  Pythagoras,  the  heathen,  on  the  discovery 
of  a  new  theorem  in  geometry,  offered  a  hundred  oxen  as  a  thank  offer- 
ing to  the  gods  for  granting  him  so  great  a  favor,  should  not  a  Christian 
college  offer  equal  thanks  for  new  truths? 

God  has  led  humanity  up  the  steeps  of  progress  to  lofty  heights  and 


3l8  MFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

wide  outlooks,  and  when  the  foot  has  become  firm,  the  head  steady,  and 
the  eye  accustomed  to  the  new  and  strong  hght,  he  has  led  them  up  to 
diviner  prospects.  Ages  may  have  passed,  generations  perished,  before 
the  new  height  was  gained.  In  this  climbing  God  has  commissioned 
great  spirits  as  light  bearers  to  lead  the  way  for  groping,  stumbling 
humanity.  He  has  also  appointed  colleges  to  stand  upon  the  heights  to 
light  the  ascent.  He  has  sent  them  as  forerunners  of  reform,  leaders  of 
progress,  harbingers  of  advancing  civilization. 

The  discovery,  introduction,  and  establishment  of  a  great  truth  as  a 
living,  governing  principle  in  the  world,  requires  time,  toil,  and  sacrifice. 
The  old  error  is  frequently  inwrought  into  systems  and  institutions 
which  have  received  the  sanction  of  generations  and  are  upheld  by  popu- 
lar prejudice,  supported  by  wealth  and  power,  and  guarded  by  custom. 
Truth  comes  unheralded  by  pomp,  unwelcomed  by  worldly  greatness. 
It  is  far  oftener  cradled  in  a  manger  and  heralded  by  only  the  lowly. 
Broad  has  ever  been  the  way  needed  to  accommodate  the  followers  of 
error,  while  narrow  has  been  the  way  required  by  the  sincere  followers 
of  truth.  The  old  and  the  new,  conservatism  and  progress,  have  ever 
been  at  war.  The  fires  of  their  strife  have  glowed  adown  the  ages. 
Truth,  through  these  conflicts,  as  great  smelting  furnaces,  has  been 
slowly  refined  from  the  dross  of  error,  and  inwrought  into  the  systems 
and  institutions  of  humanity.  Everything  great  and  valuable,  in  modern 
civilization,  bears  the  impress  of  toil,  sacrifice,  and  suffering. 

The  college  should  be  a  great  smelting  furnace  for  the  refinement  of 
truth  from  error,  for  the  world's  uses.  More  than  this,  it  should  be  first 
in  discovering  the  truths  and  laws  that  give  progress.  As  the  pines  on 
the  hilltops  stand  crowned  with  the  glory  of  the  early  morning,  while 
the  valleys  still  sit  in  the  shadows,  so  the  ideal  college  should  stand  on 
the  heights  of  progress,  on  the  world's  spiritual  pinnacles,  where  the 
mist  and  murk  of  ignorance  never  rise,  where  the  storms  of  passion  never 
sweep,  circled  with  the  halo  and  illumined  with  the  glory  of  dawning 
truth,  ere  it  has  lifted  the  shadows  from  the  valley  lands  of  everyday 
life  and  common  thought.     ... 

Blessed  is  the  college  that  both  knows  and  does  the  truth.  A 
heathen  has  said,  "  Do  right  though  the  heavens  fall."  Do  right,  and 
the  heavens  will  not  fall,  for  they  are  underpropped  and  upheld  by  truth 
and  righteousness.  Therefore,  the  college  should  ever  be  a  leader  in 
accepting  and  following  the  behests  of  truth  and  right,  in  whatever  form 
they  may  come,  at  whatever  cost  of  popularity,  in  the  full  assurance  that 
to  stand  alone  with  God,  to  follow   in  his  footsteps  and  work  in  the  line 


SERMONS.  319 

he  is  working,  is  to  be  with  the  majority  and  ultimately  to  prevail,  though 
all  the  world  at  present  oppose.     .     .     . 

All  the  business  pursuits  and  activities  whereby  men  and  women  win 
bread,  will,  through  the  light  of  culture,  take  on  nobler  and  more  ideal 
aims,  so  that,  amid  the  toil  and  care  and  friction  of  life,  the  fog  of  inde- 
cision, the  drizzle  of  worry,  tending  to  blunt  the  finer  sensibilities,  cool 
enthusiasm,  clip  the  wings  of  aspiration,  and  dim  the  light  of  life,  the 
worker  shall  be  able  to  possess  such  masterful  moods  as  to  fling  off  these 
bad  influences  and  work  in  the  light  of  these  ideal  aims. 

The  college  sends,  also,  its  students  out  into  all  the  professions  and 
positions  of  authority,  commanding  sway  and  grave  responsibility,  where 
both  the  light  of  culture  and  of  character  is  of  imperative  importance. 
They  go  as  physicians,  teachers,  preachers,  makers  and  executors  of  law, 
ministers  of  justice,  light  bearers  to  peoples  sitting  in  darkness.  Through 
these  agencies  the  world  should  become  healthier,  stronger,  better,  more 
radiant,  allegiant  to  the  eternaJ  principles  of  right  and  justice,  imbued 
more  and  more  with  peace,  good  will,  and  reverent  worship. 

The  nation  needs  to  be  pervaded  by  higher  and  more  ideal  principles. 
If  ideas  are  the  ultimate  sovereigns  of  the  world,  their  sovereignty  should 
especially  hold  sway  in  a  republic,  where  convictions  and  laws  spring 
from  the  people.  Guided  and  controlled  by  violent  partisans,  reckless 
leaders,  devoid  of  discipline,  culture,  ideas,  or  principle,  this  republic 
must,  late  or  soon,  be  wrecked,  as  other  nations  have  been.  Here  eleva- 
tion must  begin  at  the  sources  of  power,  the  people.  The  stream  can 
rise  no  higher  than  these  fountains.  The  highest  fountains  are  the 
youth.  To  the  end,  therefore,  that  they  may  be  prepared  for  the  respon- 
sibilities of  citizenship,  and  become  promoters  of  the  public  weal,  and 
conservators  of  the  republic,  through  enlightened  and  commanding 
statesmanship,  the  college  should  send  them  forth  imbued  with  principles 
that  shall  purify  and  elevate  politics,  enthrone  conscience,  making  its 
behests  higher  and  more  authoritative  than  the  mandates  of  leaders,  the 
whips  of  party,  or  the  scourges  of  machine  persecution,  making  inviolable 
personal  worthiness  and  spiritual  independence  the  sources  of  all  dignity 
of  manhood  and  of  civil  liberty. 

Again,  the  church  depends  upon  the  college  as  an  ally  to  aid  her  in 
becoming  more  and  more  a  positive  and  constructive  power  among  the 
negative  and  destructive  powers  of  the  world.     .     .     . 

The  ideal  college  stands  the  center  and  summit  of  the  highest  and 
best  in  human  thought  and  achievement,  a  testimony  to  the  worth  and 
dignity  of  man,  and  the  importance  of  culture  for  the  sake  of  manhood, 


320 


LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 


irrespective  of  outward  conditions,  a  teacher  of  the  broader  and  finer 
humanities,  with  their  ideal  and  elevating  influences  in  the  home,  society, 
State,  and  church.  Amid  the  grind  of  toil,  the  whir  and  rush  of  busi- 
ness, and  all  the  petty  strifes  and  ambitions  of  the  world,  the  college  bell 
calls  the  youth  up  to  the  serene  heights,  where  the  possibilities  of  ideal 
living  and  doing  loom  distinct  along  the  horizon,  and  all  things  conspire 
to  give  motive  and  inspiration  to  the  thoughtful  and  the  earnest,  in  pre- 
paring for  the  coming  work  of  life,     .     .     . 

This  Institution,  growing,  during  a  half  hundred  years,  from  a  private 
school,  through  the  academic  period,  up  to  its  present  stature,  has  ever 
sought  to  be  both  a  receiver  and  a  dispenser  of  light;  sought  to  be  a 
leader  in  the  great  reforms  of  the  age,  to  be  in  the  van  of  human  progress; 
sought  to  make,  not  simply  scholars,  but  scholars  charactered  in  Chris- 
tian manhood  and  womanhood,  prepared  for  brave  living  and  good  work 
in  the  world.  Though  often,  with  flickering  light,  groping,  slipping,  in 
the  rough,  obscure,  and  untried  paths,  though  often  falling  short,  in 
many  ways,  of  the  high  ideal  we  have  sketched,  yet  she  is  prepared 
for  a  healthier,  stronger  growth,  better  work,  with  happier  results,  in  the 
fifty  years  to  come,  so  that  those  who  shall  gather  to  celebrate  her  cen- 
tennial birthday  will  have  more  abundant  reasons  for  rejoicing  than  we. 

Young  friends,  you  who  are  about  to  bear  out  into  the  world  what- 
ever of  light  you  may  have  here  received,  will  need  to  go  with  minds 
ready  to  receive  ever-broadening  ranges  of  thought,  clearer  visions  of 
truth.  Gather  to  yourselves  all  light  possible  fro^m  the  culture  and  civ- 
ilization of  the  past.  Let  it  inspire  you  to  the  seeking  of  new  truths  that 
shall  unfold  into  multitudinous  forms  of  progress.  As  is  the  quality  of 
individual  culture,  so  will  be  the  character  of  the  resulting  civilization. 
Culture  not  for  the  sake  of  doing,  but  simply  for  the  sake  of  being,  is 
refined  selfishness.  When,  forgetting  self,  it  goes  out,  starting  influences 
that  shall  affect  for  good  all  streams  of  thought  and  action,  then  it  is 
noblest  and  best.  Get  to  yourselves  a  spirit  of  reverence,  gentleness,  and 
sacrificial  doing,  a  courage  of  your  convictions,  which,  above  the  cow- 
ardice of  wrongdoing,  cannot  be  swayed  from  right  doing.  Be  not  con- 
tent to  simply  glide  on  the  current  of  public  opinion,  but,  regardless  of 
popular  favor,  defend  and  promote  truth  and  right,  fearless  of  conse- 
quences. .  .  .  Truth  seeks  for  its  disciples  those  who,  leaving  behind 
the  idols  of  the  multitude,  and  regardless  of  pleasure  or  profit,  follow,  in 
glad  obedience,  her  lead.  An  utterly  honest  seeker  and  fearless  doer  of 
truth  is  the  noblest  work  of  God.  When  such  an  one  puts  in  an  appear- 
ance, it  is  the  duty  of  all  to  make  way  and  room,  and  with  uncovered 


SERMONS.  321 

head  and  uiisandaled  feet  receive  reverently  his  teachings.  His  advent 
is  to  be  reckoned  an  epoch  in  human  history,  a  new  starting-point  in 
human  progress.  The  world  is  in  perishing  need  of  such  as  receive  the 
behests  of  truth  as  higher  than  happiness,  more  sacred  than  life,  and, 
though  held  and  treated  as  fanatics,  innovators,  heretics,  by  their  own 
age,  future  ages  will  rise  up  as  one  man  to  do  them  honor. 

Go  forth,  then,  and,  guided  by  lofty  aims,  ever  labor  to  uphold, 
.strengthen,  and  advance  all  noble  interests.  Cultivate  a  love  of  manly 
excellence  and  moral  greatness.  When  to  these  are  added  influences 
and  motives  springing  from  divine  sources,  the  highest  powers  of  the 
mind  will  be  awakened,  its  chords  vibrate  in  unison  with  all  spiritual 
laws,  and  a  steady  purpose  will  be  given  to  life,  controlling  and  guiding 
amid  all  activities.  .  .  .  Through  long  and  dark  and  bloody  ages, 
when  might  and  wrong  have  occupied  the  thrones  of  the  world,  the  light 
of  truth  has  been  gaining  sway.  God,  through  august  tragedies,  has 
been  leading  humanity  ever  onward  and  upward.  Go  as  colaborers 
with  him,  in  enlightening,  educating,  and  evangelizing  the  world. 


THE  PEOPLE'S  DEBT  TO  COLLEGES. 

[An  address  delivered  before  the  New  England  Association  of  Alfred  Students, 
August  24,  1886.] 
Ladies  and  gentlemen,  members  of  the  New  England  Association  of 
Alfred  Students,  in  the  address  of  one  year  ago,  which  I  did  not  deliver, 
the  theme  was  "Alfred's  Debt  to  New  England."  The  converse  of  this 
might  be  "  New  England's  Debt  to  Alfred,"  if  it  were  not  too  small  a  ful- 
crum for  good  leverage,  and,  furthermore,  Alfred  can  never  repay  her 
great  debt  to  New  England. 

Let  us,  therefore,  consider  the  broader  and  more  comprehensive 
theme,  "The  People's  Debt  to  Colleges."  In  this  consideration  I  shall 
use  the  term  college  in  its  most  generic  sense,  based  upon  both  its  ety- 
mological signification  and  its  historic  use,  as  inclusive  of  all  higher  insti- 
tutions of  learning  or  collective  bodies  incorporated  for  the  purposes  of 
study  and  instruction. 

Education  is  a  great,  overshadowing,  and  imperative  need  of  man. 
Coming  into  the  world  with  fewer  instincts  and  powers  for  self-preserva- 
tion, and  with  capacities  more  nearly  a  blank,  than  any  other  member  of 
the  animal  kingdom,  without  education,  man  is  the  most  helpless  of  all 
animals.     It    is  only  as    his  faculties    are    slowly,  carefully,  laboriously 


322  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

unfolded,  under  the  tutelage  of  parents  and  all  the  educative  influences 
and  forces  which  spring  from  civilized  society,  crowned,  systematized, 
utilized,  by  educational  institutions  specially  devoted  to  this  object,  does 
man  come  to  his  rightful  sovereignty  in  the  world.  Colleges  have  thus 
sprung  from  the  highest  needs  of  man,  as  an  intellectual,  social,  moral, 
and  religious  being. 

Among  the  chiefest  originators  of  these  institutional  agencies  for  the 
education  of  man  up  to  this  sovereignty,  have  been  the  great  discoverers, 
inventors,  organizers,  founders  of  systems  of  religion  and  philosophy. 
These,  appearing  from  time  to  time,  have  been  the  great  world  teachers, 
whose  teachings  have  awakened  and  enlightened  the  human  mind, 
shaped  individual,  social,  and  national  destinies,  determined  and  advanced 
civilizations. 

All  future  ages,  becoming  their  willing  pupils,  have  organized  the 
light,  influences,  forces,  and  instrumentalities  generated  by  them  into 
schools  for  perpetuating  and  spreading  these  blessings,  through  all  time, 
to  all  men. 

Moses,  with  the  great  Sinaitic  wilderness  for  a  schoolroom,  had  the 
children  of  Israel  forty  years  under  his  tutelage.  The  homes,  and  the 
schools  of  the  law  and  the  prophets,  continuing  what  was  thus  begun, 
made  the  Hebrew  nation  one  of  the  best  educated  people,  as  a  whole, 
the  world  has  known.  At  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem  their  learning 
was  sown  broadcast,  furnishing  physicians,  philosophers,  and  educators 
to  many  peoples.  This  learned  preeminence  has,  in  a  good  degree,  con- 
tinued to  the  present. 

The  schools  of  Chaldea,  Egypt,  Persia,  especially  the  latter,  deter- 
mined their  civilization.  Zoroaster,  with  the  Zend  Avesta  and  the 
Magian  system  of  education  founded  thereon,  gave  to  the  Persian  nation 
leadership  in  ancient  civilization,  and  the  Parsee  of  the  present  stands 
foremost  in  Hindu  culture. 

The  teacher  Kon,  or  Confucius,  inaugurated  a  system  that  led  to  a 
State  education  and  a  government  resting  on  intellect  and  organized  cul- 
ture, intellectual  merit,  determined  by  competitive  examinations,  being  the 
only  passport  to  office,  which  has  become  the  ideal  aspiration  of  all  civil- 
service  reformers,  and  the  dismay  of  all  machine  politicians,  and  the  goal 
sought  by  all  civilized  nations.  It  has  given  the  Chinese  a  government 
and  a  civilization  that  have  remained  in  stable  equilibrium,  without  prog- 
ress or  retrogression,  for  more  than  two  thousand  years,  over  one-third 
of  the  human  race.  In  it  may  be  seen  the  prototype  of  what  other 
nations  will  be  when  old,  if  the  routines,  e.Kaminations,  markings,  and 


SERMONS.  323 

placings,  which  they  are  so  coilsomely,  so  patiently,  so  bHndly,  and  with 
such  a  steady,  dull  grind,  patterning  after  her,  shall  bear  their  legitimate 
fruits. 

The  Vedic  system  of  the  Hindus,  and  its  antagonist,  Buddhism,  with 
their  numerous  schools  of  philosophy,  their  immense  literatures,  full  of 
degenerate  puerilities,  are  the  outcome  of  great  teachers,  who,  at  the  time, 
taught  the  best  they  knew. 

The  great  schoolmasters  of  Greece  and  Rome,  Thales,  Pythagoras, 
Socrates,  Plato,  Aristotle,  Zeno,  Quintilian,  and  many  another,  confront- 
ing and  grappling  with  the  problems  that  confront  philosophers  of  to-day, 
gathered  about  them  circles  of  disciples — incipient  universities— eager 
to  listen  to  their  solutions  of  the  deep  and  solemn  mysteries  of  the  uni- 
verse, and  whose  teachings  have  profoundly  influenced  the  subsequent 
ages. 

Alexander  the  Great  did  a  greater  and  nobler  deed  than  conquering 
the  world  when  he  gave  Aristotle  a  million  of  dollars  and  the  service  of 
a  thousand  or  more  men,  to  enable  him  to  prosecute  his  studies.  This 
started  forces  that  led  to  the  founding  of  the  Museum  at  Alexandria — 
type  of  all  modern  universities — with  its  four  faculties,  of  literature,  mathe- 
matics, astronomy,  and  medicine;  with  its  library  of  700,000  volumes,  its 
botanical  gardens,  its  zoological  collections;  with  its  learned  teachers, 
gathered  from  many  nations,  and  its  dozen  thousand  or  more  students. 
It  thus  became  a  focus  of  intense  intellectual  activity.  Here  gathered  the 
Septuagint  translators  of  the  Hebrew  Scriptures,  and  the  first  professors 
of  Christian  theology.  From  it  radiated  the  highest  learning  the  world 
then  knew,  the  influences  of  which  are  still  felt. 

The  Atheneum,  founded  by  Hadrian,  on  the  Capitoline  Hill  in  Rome, 
became  the  university  of  the  Latin  race  and  the  mother  of  all  imperial 
schools  throughout  the  Roman  Empire. 

The  Mohammedans  overran  and  subjugated  the  world  no  more  rapidly 
or  completely  by  the  sword  than  they  did  by  learning.  Availing  them- 
selves of  Jews  and  Nestorians  for  teachers  and  counselors,  they  became 
distinguished  as  the  patrons  of  learning  and  the  founders  of  schools _ 
holding  that  Paradise  is  as  much  for  him  v/ho  rightly  uses  the  pen  as  for 
him  who  falls  in  battle,  and  that  the  ink  from  the  pe;i  of  the  teacher  is  of 
equal  value  with  the  blood  of  the  martyr.  Schools  arose  in  the  track  of 
their  armies,  until  nearly  the  whole  Mediterranean  region,  as  well  as  the 
more  Eastern  regions,  was  luminous  with  their  light.  Great  gramma- 
rians, philosophers,  physicians,  mathematicians,  and  astronomers  arose. 
In  their  schools  was  first  instituted  the  system  of  academic  honors  or 


324  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

titles  signifying  tliat  the  possessor  was  competent  to  teach,  which  has 
continued  down  to  the  present.  While  the  rest  of  the  world  was  fast 
sinking  into  the  night  of  the  Dark  Ages,  Moslem  learning  cast  a  radiance 
over  the  gloom. 

But  the  Rabbi  of  rabbis,  the  great  Teacher  of  the  great  world-teachers, 
was  Jesus  of  Nazareth.  Recognized  as  a  rabbi,  though  discarding,  on 
the  one  hand,  the  traditions  that  made  void  the  higher  law  through  rev- 
erence for  the  letter  regardless  of  the  spirit,  which  gave  rise  to  the  Tal- 
mud and  the  Pharisee,  discarding,  on  the  other  hand,  the  esoteric  inter- 
pretation of  the  law,  which  culminated  in  the  Kabala  and  the  Mystic,  he 
differed  widely  in  his  teachings  from  all  other  rabbis.  He  taught  face 
to  face  with  nature,  man,  and  God.  He  gave  object  lessons  from  the  lily, 
the  mustard  seed,  the  fig  tree,  the  sparrow,  the  foxes,  the  leaven  of  bread, 
the  sower  and  his  seed,  and  the  golden  grain  of  the  harvest,  the  coin  of 
the  realm,  and  from  all  common  human  avocations,  finding  in  all  deepest 
spiritual  meanings.  His  teachings  reached  both  head  and  heart,  and  bore 
fruit  abundantly.  He  not  only  brought  a  new  life  into  humanity,  but 
intellect  was  likewise  awakened  wherever  this  life  came. 

This  awakening  influence  upon  mind  led  early  to  the  establishment  of 
schools  for  the  instruction  of  youth  and  proselytes  in  the  duties  of  religion 
and  Christian  manners,  also  other  schools  for  giving  religious  teachers  a 
systematic  knowledge  of  Christian  doctrines.  To  these  schools  flocked 
learned  pagans,  as  well  as  young  men  desirous  of  being  instructed  in  the 
doctrines  of  Christianity,  to  the  end  of  becoming  teachers  in  the  church. 
Thus,  for  three  or  four  hundred  years,  these  schools  were  the  centers  of 
learning  and  the  nurseries  of  piety.  Indeed,  many  churches  were  virtu- 
ally schools,  in  which  the  bishops  trained  with  special  care,  as  if  they 
were  their  own  children,  those  who,  in  turn,  were  to  become  spiritual 
guides  and  religious  teachers.  In  every  diocese  there  was  at  least  one 
cathedral  school,  designed  to  instruct,  not  only  catechumens,  but  to  carry 
forward  the  education  of  those  who  aspired  to  the  sacred  office.  Thus 
did  the  early  Christians,  inspired  by  the  vitalizing,  invigorating,  and  lib- 
eralizing power  of  the  gospel,  prepare  their  children,  amid  poverty  and 
persecution,  to  become  worthy  and  efficient  Christian  men. 

The  Dark  Ages  gradually  drew  on.  Decay  and  death  seized  upon 
the  pagan  institutions,  though  under  the  patronage  of  kings  and  emper- 
ors, with  ample  endowments,  costly  libraries,  and  all  the  educational 
facilities  of  the  times.  Though  rare  privileges  and  advantages  were  con- 
ferred upon  their  teachers,  the  teaching  gradually  degenerated  into  a 
tame,    lifeless    system    of   effeminate   forms,  fancies,  and    dull    routines.. 


SERMONS.  325 

Pagan  civilization,  unfit  to  be  engrafted  with  the  Christian  civilization, 
went  down  amid  the  overwhelming  incursions  of  the  Northern  barbarians. 
Pagan  schools  perished  in  the  general  shipwreck.  Not  so  with  the  Chris- 
tian; but,  as  if  rising  from  a  baptism  of  fire  and  blood,  they  struggled  to 
overcome  disadvantages  and  adversaries.  In  them  was  still  much  life, 
thought,  and  activity.  Christian  literature  abounded  more  and  more  in 
the  production  of  great  statesmen,  philosophers,  and  divines.  The  cathe- 
dral schools  were  gradually  formed  into  organizations,  as  monasteries, 
with  a  school  attached  for  the  instruction  of  youth.  These  became  the 
germs  from  which  sprang  the  modern  college.  In  them  religion  found  a 
covert  from  the  storms  of  the  times,  and  the  learned  and  the  pious  a  safe 
retreat  for  study,  meditation,  prayer,  discussion,  and  teaching.  These 
institutions  rapidly  increased,  till  they  spread  like  a  network  over  all 
Europe.  But  at  the  nadir  of  the  Dark  Ages  sacred  learning  disappeared 
even  from  them,  giving  place  to  legends,  puerile  sermonizing,  and  scho- 
lastic teachings. 

At  length  the  light  began  to  dawn,  the  scene  to  brighten,  and  an 
upward  movement  commenced.  The  dawn  of  this  light  was  earlier  in 
the  British  Isles  than  on  the  Continent.  Schools  and  learning  prospered 
better,  especially  in  Ireland,  and  were  transplanted  thence  to  the  island 
of  lona,  whence  they  spread,  through  the  labors  of  Columbia  and  his  dis- 
ciples, wide  and  far.  Bede  caught  up  the  light  and  bore  it  on.  Alcuin, 
educated  in  the  institutions  thus  lighted,  became  the  great  leader  and 
champion  of  learning  of  his  times.  Charlemagne,  unable  to  write,  being 
compelled  to  sign  with  the  hilt  of  his  sword  those  treaties  which  he 
enforced  with  its  point,  invited  Alcuin  to  France,  made  him  his  confidant, 
counselor,  and  teacher.and  established  a  school  in  his  own  palace, becoming 
a  most  enthusiastic  student,  and  though,  like  most  great  men,  making  but 
an  indifferent  penman,  he  became  able  to  speak  Latin  and  Greek.  Thus 
were  laid  the  foundations  of  the  university  of  Paris,  leading  to  the  estab- 
lishment of  the  Germanic  universities,  and  to  the  intellectual  supremacy 
of  the  Northern  nations  of  Europe  over  the  Southern.  Alfred  the  Great, 
amid  the  multitudinous  cares  of  his  kingdom,  labored  assiduously  to 
advance  the  cause  of  education  among  his  people,  organizing  forces  that 
led  to  the  upbuilding  of  the  great  English  universities,  and  perpetuated 
learning  and  religion  down  to  Wickliffe,  "the  bright  morning  star" 
of  the  Reformation.  The  German  and  other  universities  followed  and 
nurtured  the  Reformation.  Erfurt  and  Wittenburg  gave  the  world  a 
Luther,  Heidelberg,  and  Tubingen,  a  Melanchthon,  Berne  and  Basel,  a 
Zwingli.     The  college  founded  at  Oxford,  to  counteract  the  influence  of 


326  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

Wickliffe,  nurtured  the  Wesleys  and  Methodism.  Sir  Walter  Mildmay, 
after  founding  Emanuel  College,  Cambridge,  in  1585,  coming  up  to  the 
court  of  Queen  Elizabeth,  she  said  to  him,  "Sir  Walter,  I  hear  you  have 
erected  a  Puritan  foundation."  He  replied,  "I  have  set  an  acorn,  which, 
when  it  becomes  an  oak,  God  alone  knows  what  will  be  the  fruit  thereof" 
Emanual  College  proved  to  be  the  nursery  of  Puritanism,  and  the  source 
from  which  emanated  much  of  the  learning,  intellectual  vigor,  and  reli- 
gious power  of  the  early  New  England  colonies,  the  stream  of  whose 
influence  has  been  manifested  in  the  Christian  enlightenment  and  progress 
which  has  characterized  the  entire  history  of  New  England,  and  has  given 
origin,  not  only  to  her  own  colleges,  but  also  to  most  of  those  of  the 
other  Northern  States. 

From  this  same  influence  sprang  a  still  greater  boon,  if  possible,  to 
the  world, — the  common,  or  public  free  school.  The  college  did  not 
spring  from  the  common  school  but  it  sprang  from  the  college.  It  never 
rains  up,  but  always  down.  So  education  has  rained  down  from  the  great 
world  teachers,  through  the  medium  of  the  college,  spreading  out  in  these 
modern  times  into  the  common  school.  First  the  college,  then  the  pri- 
vate school  or  academy  to  fit  bo3's  for  college,  then  schools  and  semina- 
ries to  fit  girls,  not  for  college,  but  to  be  helpmeets  for  collegians,  and, 
lastly,  the  school  common  to  all.  To  New  England  belongs  the  immortal 
honor  of  inaugurating  these  schools,  both  in  Massachusetts  and  Connec- 
ticut, within  a  decade  after  the  founding  of  Harvard. 

Emanuel  College,  thus  planted  as  an  acorn,  has  been  the  type  of  most 
colleges  founded  on  a  religious  basis,  for  the  end  of  advancing  both  learn- 
ing and  religion.  Almost  uniformly  these  have  sprung  from  acorns 
planted  in  faith  and  hope,  not  simply  for  the  present,  but  for  future  gen- 
erations. Oxford  began  in  the  teachings  of  a  few  poor  monks;  Cam- 
bridge took  its  start  in  a  barn;  Harvard  commenced  with  three  students, 
when  Boston,  as  yet,  was  only  a  straggling  village  of  a  score  or  so  of 
small  houses;  Yale,  in  the  gift  of  a  few  books  from  the  libraries  of  neigh- 
boring clergymen;  Princeton,  in  a  log  house,  known  as  "Log  College;" 
Brown,  with  one  student;  Dartmouth,  from  an  Indian  mission  'school; 
Oberlin,  in  the  primeval  forest;  Wabash,  in  a  prayer  meeting  on  the 
snow  in  the  forest;  Milton,  in  a  little  gravel  building,  erected  through  the 
enterprise  and  public  spirit  of  a  single  individual;  Alfred,  in  a  small 
upper  room.  Most  of  these  had  for  long  }'ears  a  slow  and  struggling 
growth.  "A  hundred  \'ears  old,  and  no  taller,"  said  the  fabled  gourd  to 
the  venerable  palm,  to  whose  top  it  had  climbed  in  a  single  summer. 
"Every  summer  of  my  life,"  replied  the  palm,  "a  gourd  has  climbed  up 


SERMONS.  327 

around  me,  as  proud  as  thou  art,  and,  as  short  lived  as  thou  wilt  be." 
Thus  with  colleges;  they  grow  as  trees  grow,  as  nations,  as  languages 
grow,  from  small  beginnings  and  simple  forms,"  gathering  slowly,  through 
the  centuries,  strength,  beauty,  complexness  of  means  and  instrumental- 
ities, and  the  power  of  diffusing  the  light  of  learning  and  all  those  forces 
that  give  progress  and  civilization.  Even  those  institutions  that,  in  mod- 
ern times,  have  been  manufactured  by  the  power  of  great  wealth,  with 
large  physical  proportions  at  the  start,  require,  nevertheless,  time  to  get 
the  atmosphere,  tone,  spirit,  and  character  given  by  culture. 

Thus  we  have  passed  in  review  before  you  some  of  the  great  torch 
bearers  of  truth,  their  lights  obscured,  in  varying  degrees,  by  the  smoke 
of  error,  up  to  the  clear  light  of  the  great  Light-bearer  and  World- 
teacher,  Jesus,  the  Christ,  who  have  led  humanity  in  its  slow  and  toil- 
some progress  from  the  darkness  and  bondage  of  savagism  towards  the 
promised  land  of  the  light  and  liberty  of  civilization.  Humanity,  organ- 
izing the  results  of  their  teachings  into  schools,  has  been  helped  on  more 
and  more,  as  the  ages  have  gone  by.  Modern  universities  and  colleges, 
some  half  a  thousand  or  more,  have  thus  arisen,  one  by  one,  on  the  men- 
tal night  of  the  world,  changing  it  by  slow  degrees  into  the  dawning  and 
early  light  of  a  continually  brightening  day.  Every  State,  every  great 
city,  in  Europe,  is  enriched  and  ennobled  by  them.  They  are  scattered 
broadcast  throughout  the  American  republic.  They  have  gone  wher- 
ever civilization  has  gone.  Popes,  kings,  princes,  States,  denominations, 
individuals,  have  founded  them  or  contributed  to  their  support. 

Colleges  are  thus  the  topmost  blossoms  and  fruitage  of  civilization. 
As  is  civilization  so  are  colleges;  conversely,  as  are  colleges,  so  is  civili- 
zation. They  interpenetrate  and  interplay  upon  each  other.  They  are 
coordinates.  All  great  and  permanent  advancement  in  modern  civiliza- 
tion has  been  dependent  upon  great  teachers  and  seats  of  learning,  and 
such  conditions  will  obtain  more  and  more.  It  was  the  saying  of  the 
Chinese  teacher,  Mencius,  that  "a  sage  instructs  a  hundred  generations." 
Colleges  gather  the  wisdom  of  the  sages  of  all  ages  for  the  enlarged 
instruction  of  all  men.  Thus,  notwithstanding  their  imperfections  in 
manifold  directions,  they  enable  us  to  enter  into  the  labors,  become  the 
inheritors,  of  all  the  achievements  of  the  human  mind,  live  in  the  glory  of 
the  world's  accumulated  knowledge  and  experience.  They  crown  and 
bind  and  give  unity,  strength,  character,  and  efficiency  to  all  other  insti- 
tutions and  instrumentalities  for  the  education  of  man  and  the  progress 
of  civilization.  They  bring  to  their  aid  all  historic  memorials, — imple- 
ments, coins,  tombs,  temples,  statues,  inscriptions,  parchments,  traditions; 


328  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

all  superstitions,  religions,  customs;  all  evil  and  good,  individual,  social, 
political,  religious ;  all  language,  literature,  art,  science,  libraries,  muse- 
ums. They,  likewise,  become  intellectual  observatories,  for  discovering 
the  lights  of  new  truths,  as  they  rise  upon  the  mental  firmament,  labora- 
tories for  observation  and  experiment  upon  all  the  phenomena,  forces,  and 
laws  of  the  universe.  They  perpetuate  the  highest  standards  of  excel- 
lence of  all  the  past,  enabling  us  to  share  the  best  and  noblest  the  race 
has  produced  on  all  matters  of  greatest  import,  enlarge  the  domain  of 
knowledge,  multiply  the  instrumentalities  for  its  acquisition,  organize  and 
diffuse  these,  through  the  agencies  of  trained  intellect,  for  the  benefit  of 
every  man. 

In  doing  this  the  colleges  have  ready  at  hand,  in  addition  to  living 
instructors,  manifold  other  aids.  As  the  editor,  when  his  brain  becomes 
like  a  squeezed  lemon,  with  all  the  juice  of  thought  pressed  out  by  the 
exactions  of  his  avocation,  calls  to  his  aid  his  skilled  scissors,  which,  like 
a  wizard's  wand,  cause  his  paper  to  gleam  with  the  best  and  brightest 
thoughts  of  a  hundred  brains,  to  the  delight  and  instruction  of  thousands 
of  readers,  so  a  college,  however  spongy,  vacuous,  and  vapid  the  brains 
of  its  teachers  from  long  over-squeezing  and  over-pumping;  can  summon 
to  its  assistance  all  the  great  spirits  of  both  the  past'  and  present,  with 
their  productions,  to  help  in  teaching  and  inspiring. 

The  ancient  languages,  among  the  highest  achievements  of  human 
intelligence,  were  perfected  and  freighted  with  the  richest  literatures  and 
sent  down  through  twenty  to  thirty  centuries,  and,  although  unchanged 
themselves,  they  have  created  or  transformed,  enriched  and  ennobled,  all 
modern  languages  and  literatures,  and  have  been  the  great  teachers  of  the 
humanities  to  man.  The  master-minds  among  the  ancients,— their  great 
poets,  orators,  statesmen,  historians, — who  used  these  languages  as  a 
medium  for  communicating  and  preserving  their  thoughts,  have  occupied 
honored  chairs  in  all  seats  of  learning  adown  the  ages,  awakening,  invig- 
orating, and  refining  intellectual  life  and  activity. 

Mathematics,  a  science  dealing  with  abstract  numbers  and  forms  of 
pure  reason,  would  seem,  at  first  blush,  to  have  little  relation  to  the  mate- 
rial and  industrial  ongoings  of  the  world;  )^et  mathematics  has  a  vital 
play  in  all  the  arts  and  sciences— every  human  industry  feeling  and 
acknowledging  its  sway.  Euclid,  the  fl\ther  and  professor  of  mathemat- 
ics in  that  famous  school  at  Alexandria,  taught  a  science  as  perfect  in 
kind,  and  as  direct,  unerring,  stimulating,  and  strengthening  to  the  stu- 
dent twenty-two  hundred  years  ago  as  now.  He  has  continued  to 
occupy  the  chair  of  mathematics,  in  the  persons  of  its  teachers,  to  the 


SERMONS.  329 

present,  sharpening,  invigorating  the  minds  of  all  through  this  rich  pos- 
session and  wonderful  educator. 

Ptolemy,  professor  of  geography  and  astronomy  in  the  same  great 
school,  who  held  almost  supreme  sway  in  these  sciences  for  over  a  thou- 
sand years,  has  lived  in  the  lives  of  all  geographers  and  astronomers,  as 
well  as  the  teachers  and  students  of  these  sciences,  since,  enlarging  the 
knowledge  of  the  earth  and  heavens,  and  helping  on  navigation,  com- 
merce, and  all  dependent  pursuits.  Though  a  little  antiquated  in  his 
mappings  of  the  earth  and  in  his  astronomical  theories,  he  is  still  young 
in  spirit  and  enthusiastic  as  ever  in  his  helpfulness.  Hippocrates,  the 
father  of  medicine,  who  has  been,  in  the  persons  of  his  successors,  minis- 
tering to  sickness  and  suffering  for  twenty-two  centuries,  and  teaching  in 
all  schools  of  medicine,  is  still  an  aid  to  all  that  teach,  or  learn,  or  prac- 
tice the  beneficent  art  of  healing.  Aristotle  not  only  taught  in  his  day, 
but  has  since  been  teaching,  and  is  still  ready  to  aid  wherever  natural 
science,  logic,  or  philosophy  is  taught,  or  wherever  scientific  investigators 
are  laboring. 

Philosophy,  the  highest  fruitage  of  the  human  reason,  the  product  of 
the  loftiest  minds  that  have  appeared  in  the  annals  of  time,  has,  from  the 
dawn  of  the  four  great  inquiries,  Whence?  How?  Why?  Whereto?  been, 
next  to  religion,  the  great  educator  of  man.  Its  great  exponents,  Socrates> 
Plato,  and  their  coadjutors,  are  still  living  in  spirit  and  teaching  in  the 
realm  of  philosophy,  guiding  and  inspiring  in  the  realm  of  morals. 

Science,  the  youngest  in  this  gifted  and  beneficent  train  of  educators 
of  the  race,  is  but  just  advancing  to  her  seat  of  authority,  to  her  throne 
of  power;  but  she  comes  with  the  vigor  and  enthusiasm  of  youth,  bear- 
ing in  her  hand  the  scepter  of  man's  sovereignty  over  nature,  attended 
by  a  splendid  retinue  of  observers,  experimenters,  investigators,  truth- 
seekers,  in  all  the  realms  of  nature.  Their  teachings  are  full  of  life,  stir, 
impulse,  giving  a  many-eyed  insight  into  nature,  a  many-handed  grip 
upon  her  utilities. 

Religion,  the  supremest  gift  and  blessing  to  man,  not  only  gave  being 
to  colleges,  but  has  ever  been  their  greatest  light  and  highest  inspiration. 
Moses  and  the  prophets,  Christ  and  the  apostles,  have  occupied  honored 
chairs  in  all  seats  of  learning,  born  of  the  spirit  of  their  teachings,  and 
exerted  supreme  influence  in  the  education,  guidance,  and  control  of  all 
that  have  gathered  about  these  seats,  till  these  latter  days,  wherein  some 
State  schools,  and  others,  have  shut  the  schoolhouse  door  in  their  faces, 
with  notification  that  all  are  welcome  there  except  the  best,  and  that  all 
things  are  taught  there  except  religion,  the  most  important. 


330 


LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 


All  these  great  themes  are  continuously  present  as  aids  and  forces  in 
colleges.  All  the  great  of  the  earth  are  perpetually  present  in  spirit,  as 
presiding  and  controlling  powers,  to  teach,  to  inspire,  to  guide,  full  of 
helpfulness  to  both  teacher  and  student,  and  whose  influences  beat  out 
thence  in  ever-widening  circles  upon  the  world. 

Thus  from  colleges  have  flowed  constantly  enlarging  streams  of 
knowledge,  culture,  progress,  and  civilization.  Their  influences  have 
been  for  ages,  and  are  still,  silently  yet  effectively,  exerted  in  homes, 
churches,  market-places,  legislative  halls,  seats  of  justice — in  all  human 
interests  and  enterprises.  College-trained  men  have  been  running  to  and 
fro  in  the  earth  that  knowledge  may  be  increased.  By  these  trained 
men  the  gospel  has  been  carried  to  all  peoples  in  their  native  tongues, 
the  Bible  translated  into  most  of  the  languages  of  the  earth,  the  best 
thoughts  preserved  in  the  writings  of  man  in  all  ages  and  languages, 
transferred  into  all  modern  languages.  Homer,  Socrates,  Plato,  Herod- 
otus, Thucidides,  Euripides,  Eschylus,  Sophocles,  Demosthenes,  Virgil, 
Cicero — all  the  great  historians,  philosophers,  poets,  orators — teach  and 
speak  and  sing  again  to  man,  each  one  hearing  them  in  the  tongue  in 
which  he  was  born.  Moses  and  David  and  Isaiah  and  Ezekiel,  and  evan- 
gelists and  apostles,  and  even  Jesus,  cross  the  thresholds  of  all  homes, 
sit  by  the  hearthstone,  and  talk  with  every  home  circle  in  its  own  home 
language. 

Again,  colleges  keep  the  common  intelligence  of  civilized  communi- 
ties up  to  the  discovering,  inventing  and  organizing  pitch;  industries  put 
and  keep  the  body  in  trim  as  a  working  machine,  with  hands  pliable  and 
dexterous,  fingers  nimble  and  deft,  for  applying  these  discoveries  and 
inventions  in  the  multitudinous  utilities  of  modern  enterprise.  The 
advent  of  these  great  improvements  that  are  revolutionizing  the  world 
had  to  wait  till  colleges  had  prepared  the  way,  by  the  gradual  and  silent 
diffusion  of  the  light  of  knowledge,  making  it  sufficiently  light  to  see 
to  work.  Man  cannot  work  to  any  better  purpose  in  mental  than  in 
physical  darkness. 

Man  made  no  progress  in  his  rapidity  of  land  travel  from  the  time  he 
tamed  the  first  camel  and  horse  on  the  plains  of  Central  Asia  till  steam 
came,  at  the  bidding  of  science,  as  a  willing  servant,  to  his  aid.  Man 
made  no  advance  in  the  rapidity  of  recording  his  thought  and  multiply- 
ing this  record  from  the  time  of  the  first  invention  of  the  pen  till  trained 
intellect  brough  the  printing  press  to  his  aid.  He  did  not  get  beyond 
sending  his  thoughts  faster  than  he  could  go  himself  till  the  lightnings, 
li.stening  to   the  call  of  intellect  and  science,  came  as    his  willing  and 


SERMONS.  331 

nimble  mail-carrier.  Alchemy  improved  but  little,  and  contributed  less 
to  human  weal,  through  long  ages,  but  when  the  universities  of  Europe, 
with  their  trained  observers  and  experimenters,  with  their  cooperative 
systems  of  labor  and  mutual  helpfulness,  entered  the  field,  then  the 
science  of  chemistry  grew  with  rapidity.  Half  a  century  ago  Liebig  set 
up,  at  the  little  University  of  Giessen,  the  first  educational  laboratory, 
with  experimental  instruction  in  chemistry,  that  became  the  prototype 
after  which  the  laboratories  now  found  in  all  higher  institutions  of  learn- 
ing have  been  constructed  and  conducted.  Thus  chemistry  has  become 
a  great  educational  force,  and,  entering  into  manifold  productive  indus- 
tries, has  brought  incalculable  blessings  to  man. 

All  these  advances  ha%'e  come  through  the  discovering  and  utilizing, 
by  scientific  processes,  the  hidden  law^s  and  forces  of  nature.  She  yields 
her  secrets  only  to  an  intelligent  questioning,  becoming  more  and  more 
an  open  secret  as  man  climbs  the  scale  of  intelligence.  The  more 
knowledge  he  carries  ia  his  brain  and  skill  in  his  hand,  the  more  he 
employs  scientific  insight  and  methods,  the  more  readily  does  she 
respond  and  willingly  become  his  ally  and  servant.  The  higher  educa- 
tion of  modern  times  gathers,  with  continually  increasing  interest  and 
success,  light  from  the  great  zodiac  of  sciences  that  begirts  human  prog- 
ress, and  uses  it  for  the  advancement  of  the  productive  industries,  thus 
making  every  material  thing  conduce  to  both  educational  and  industrial 
ends.  Every  language,  literature,  science,  or  philosophy  learned  by 
man,  adds  a  new  eye  to  his  seeing  power,  a  new  hand  to  his  working 
power. 

It  is  not  necessary  to  stand  within  the  direct  rays  of  the  sun  to  get 
the  benefits  of  the  day.  Its  diffused  light  lights  where  the  sun  is  not 
seen.  So  the  diffused  light  of  college  culture  lights  all.  Every  investi- 
gator, discoverer,  inventor,  organizer,  writer,  whose  achievements  are 
helping  on  human  progress,  whether  college-bred  or  not,  is  surrounded 
by  an  invisible  companionship  of  scholars,  who  touch  mental  elbows  with 
him.  He  labors  in  an  intellectual  atmosphere,  surcharged  with  culture. 
As  the  keeper  of  the  station  on  the  top  of  Mt.  Washington  once  said  to 
us  that,  sitting  in  his  stone  hut  during  the  thunderstorms  which  fre- 
quently envelop  the  mountain,  he  could,  by  simply  reaching  out  his 
hands,  grasp  them  full  of  thunderbolts,  hurtling  thick  about  him,  so 
these  men  are  so  thickly  surrounded  by  ideas,  flying  in  the  atmosphere 
of  culture,  that  they  have  only  to  reach  out  to  grasp  their  hands  full  of 
ideas.  Their  achievements  were  impossible  without  the  ideas  perpetually 
beating  out  from  college  classrooms,  lecture  halls,  libraries,  and  museums. 


332  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

Many  discoveries  and  inventions,  it  is  true,  seem  to  come  by  accident,  but 
such  accidents  never  happen  except  in  lands  lighted  by  colleges.  As 
well  a  Shakespeare,  a  Burns,  a  Bunyan,  a  Watt,  a  Stevenson,  a  Faraday, 
a  Franklin,  a  Rumford,  a  Spencer,  an  Edison,  as  a  Chaucer,  a  De  Cartes,  a 
Bacon,  a  Newton,  a  Milton,  a  Leibnitz,  a  Liebig,  a  Hugo,  a  Tennyson,  a 
Browning,  a  Lowell,  a  Longfellow — all  alike  have  been  dependent  upon 
the  college  as  the  ultimate  source  of  light.  Let  there  be  the  discovery 
of  a  great  principle  in  mathematics,  literature,  science,  art,  law,  morality, 
theology — immediately  does  it  spread  to  all  seats  of  learning,  and  is  by 
them  used  to  the  end  of  enlightenment,  growth,  culture  of  mind,  and 
thence  distributed  broadcast,  not  an  ephemeral  news,  but  as  leaven,  to 
leaven  gradually  but  surely  the  whole  body  of  mind.  Thus  they  become 
a  constant  incentive  to  the  seeking  of  new  truth,  and,  as  the  region  of  the 
unknown  is  infinitely  greater  than  the  known,  as  but  a  few  pebbles  have 
been  gathered  along  the  shores  of  its  untraversed  and  mysterious  ocean, 
ample  is  the  opportunity  for  future  navigators  and  explorers. 

Again,  where  colleges  are  best  and  most  abundant,  there  culture  and 
civilization  are  best;  wherever  they  have  longest  existed  and  been  most 
effective,  other  things  being  equal,  there  man's  external  conditions  have 
become  most  ameliorated,  enlarged,  improved;  his  intellect  has  been 
most  distinguished  by  energy,  brilliancy,  and  power;  his  spiritual  nature 
most  quickened,  refined,  and  elevated;  domestic  virtue,  business  honor, 
obedience  to  law,  enlarged  benevolence,  missionary  enterprise,  and  prac- 
tical religion  have  most  abounded. 

These  ends  they  secure  by  cultivating,  in  the  first  instance,  the  virtues 
that  lead  up  to  them  in  the  student;  and,  in  the  second,  by  fostering, 
through  these,  the  same  in  the  community  at  large.  Every  man  of  cul- 
ture, in  proportion  as  he  is  trained  in  mental  activities,  ready  in  varied 
knowledge,  with  powers  under  control,  strong,  alert,  many  ways  accom- 
plished, does  he  become  a  delight,  an  inspiration,  and  an  influence  to  all. 
Though  we  not  infrequently  smile  aloud  at  the  pedantic  claims  and 
supercilious  airs  of  some  college  fledgling,  more  noted,  perhaps,  for  his 
ingenuity  in  avoiding  both  work  and  restraint,  and  in  devising  ways  and 
means  for  spending  money  he  never  earned,  than  in  getting  culture,  yet 
we  all  feel  the  subtile  influence  of  a  person  of  true  culture.  Such  an  one 
in  a  community  infects  all  with  the  contagion  of  culture.  Two  churches 
located  in  juxtaposition,  with  a  ministry,  one  pious,  earnest,  learned, 
refined,  the  other  pious,  earnest,  but  unlearned,  unrefined,  this  continu- 
ing for  a  few  generations,  and  they  will  become  as  unlike  as  their  pastors. 
Two  towns,  one  settled  by  educated,  the  other  by  uneducated  pioneers. 


SERMONS.  333 

and  they  will  have  impressed  upon  them  like  characteristics,  that  will 
remain  for  centuries,  almost  as  definitely  defined  as  the  town  lines.  Our 
country,  especially  the  older  portions,  abounds  in  illustrative  examples. 
Heredity  is  a  law  of  the  mental  and  the  social,  as  of  the  physical  world. 
We  get  culture  by  heredity,  by  absorption,  by  assimilation.  Society  is  a 
cooperative  school,  where  all  are  both  teachers  and  pupils.  But,  without 
the  e\'er-present  light  from  the  altar  fires  of  colleges,  where  the  sacred 
flames  of  culture  are  perpetually  guarded  that  they  die  not,  this  busy, 
care-encumbered  world  would  soon  lose  sight  of  the  ideal  excellence  of 
learning,  amid  the  darkness  that  would  gather  soon,  fast  and  faster. 
These  altar  fires  warm  and  enthuse  all  coming  within  their  influence. 

One's  mental  life  and  health  depend  largely  upon  the  degree  to 
which  the  intellectual  atmosphere  surrounding  him  is  oxygenated  with 
culture.  The  college  has  for  its  object  the  ozonizing  of  this  atmosphere 
with  learning  to  the  best  condition  possible.  Without  the  ever-present 
influence  of  high  culture,  the  harmonious  development  of  the  whole 
being  is  prone,  in  the  hot  pursuits  and  collisions  of  life,  to  become  a 
secondary  consideration.  Each  one's  calling,  absorbing  all  the  energies, 
is  constantly  drawing  all  his  powers  into  specialties;  but,  like  a  rubber 
string,  the  more  it  is  thus  drawn  out,  the  weaker  it  becomes.  When  a 
person  gets  to  thinking  and  talking  only  oyster,  or  clam,  or  dog,  or 
horse,  or  store,  or  mill,  or  machinery,  or  cheese,  or  newspaper,  or  school, 
or  politics,  he  is  fast  degenerating  into  a  machine  or  hack  politician, 
printing  press,  mill,  dog,  oyster,  and  at  last,  as  the  fabled  oysters  created 
for  a  thousand  years  by  Saturn,  into  sea  foam. 

College  culture  is  a  means  for  removing  lobsidedness,  incompleteness, 
clannishness,  pro\-incialism,  low  impulses,  though  it  often  sadly  fails  in 
doing  so.  It  tends  to  vitalize  and  bring  into  organic  union  all  specialties, 
steady  and  shape  all  abnormal  tendencies,  and  give  symmetrical  growth 
to  all  faculties. 

Plato  said,  "A  boy  in  his  natural  state  is  the  most  vicious  of  all  wild 
beasts."  Another  affirms,  "A  boy  is  better  unborn  than  untaught." 
Still  another,  "A  boy  is  something  that  we  cannot  live  with  or  without." 
This  last  aphorism  applies  to  girls  as  well.  It  is  a  very  slow,  difficult, 
and  expensive  process  to  convert  the  average  natural  boy  into  a  com- 
plete man — a  man 

"  Whose  tongue  is  framed  to  music, 
Whose  hand  is  armed  with  skill. 
Whose  face  is  the  mould  of  beauty, 
And  his  heart  the  throne  of  will." 


334  LIFE    OP^    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

"  He  must  be  musical, 
Tremulous,  impressional, 
Alive  to  the  gentle  influence 
Of  landscape  and  of  sky, 
And  tender  to  the  Spirit's  touch  ; 
But  to  his  native  center  fast, 
Shall  into  future  fuse  the  past, 
And  the  world's  flowing  fates 
In  his  own  mould  recast." 

"Can  rules  or  tutors  educate 
This  demigod  whom  we  await?  " 

Hardly;  but  how  to  work  the  average  boy  and  girl,  not  up  to,  but 
towards,  this  high  ideal,  this  is  the  question,  this  the  problem  that  all 
teachers  in  all  ages  have  been  striving  to  solve.  Not  by  leaving  them, 
like  unpruned  trees,  to  grow  up  according  to  their  own  sweet  wills,  not 
by  leaving  them  to  sports  and  plays,  and  the  innumerable  contrivances 
which  such  are  up  to,  for  spending  both  time  and  money,  regardless  ot 
consequences,  can  this  great  end  be  attained.  Nor  does  the  public  school 
give  a  good  finish.  It  dismisses  them  in  just  that  inchoate  condition, 
that  incipient  stage  in  the  development  of  mind,  tastes,  habits,  and  char- 
acter, in  which,  if  they  are  left  for  their  future  education  simply  to  skim 
the  cream  from  the  pans  set  forth  by  the  periodicals  of  the  day,  or  to 
browse  about  in  a  haphazard  way  among  the  literatures  and  sciences, 
they  may  turn  out  a  sermon,  or  they  may  turn  out  a  song,  or  they  may 
turn  out  neither  the  one  nor  the  other,  as  to  all  genuine  culture.  To 
approach  anywhere  near  the  desired  end,  other  long  years  of  very  steady, 
serious  work  are  needed. 

President  Kenyon  used  to  say  that,  if  he  should  be  remembered,  he 
desired  the  remembrance  to  be  simply  of  his  being  good  at  drill,  and  in 
securing  mental  concentration.  Yes,  it  is  drill  and  mental  concentration, 
self-imposed,  even  a  dead  grind,  with  as  much  of  motive  and  inspiration 
as  you  please  thrown  in,  that  is  needed.  Right  and  good  culture  is 
attained  only  by  the  hardest  work, — by  work  incessant  and  long  con- 
tinued, even  unto  monotony  and  weariness,  and  by  curbing,  with  strong, 
steady  hand,  all  shiftless,  wayward  impulses  and  undesirable  propensities, 
and  by  spurring  up,  often  and  hard,  all  irresolute  and  lagging  proclivities. 

Colleges  have  for  their  aim  to  aid  in  this  high  enterprise,  aiding  stu- 
dents, first  of  all,  to  make  men  and  women  of  themselves,  being  assured 
that,  if  they  fail  in  this,  they  will  fail  in  everything  else.  To  this  end 
they  should  be  a  genuine  republic  of  letters,  wherein  all  seekers  of  culture 
are  eligible  to  citizenship,  irrespective  of  sex,  race,  class,  or  any  other 


SERMONS.  335 

external  condition  or  consideration,   but  where  hi<^h  aims,  earnestness, 
industry,  enterprise,  and  moral  worth  receive  their  true  guerdon. 

Colleges  in  securing  these,  in  order  to  produce  the  happiest  results, 
need,  like  churches,  to  be  sown  broadcast  among  the  people,  and  sus- 
tained by  their  sympathies  and  by  their  liberalities,  thereby  cultivating 
the  spirit  of  benevolence,  enterprise,  and  progress,  and  lifting  the  whole 
community  into  a  higher  plane  of  thinking,  planning,  and  doing.  Every 
college  bell  is  a  genuine  missionary,  awakening  all  within  its  sound  to 
new  intellectual  life  and  activity.  They  foster  other  than  material  aims, 
and  light  up  all  the  region  with  a  "  light  not  seen  on  sea  or  land"  by  the 
natural  eye,  and  do  a  good  inestimable,  beyond  what  would  accrue  if 
only  some  of  the  well-to-do  and  the  rich  went  to  some  distant  great 
school.  This  is  especially  important  in  a  republic,  where  the  degree  and 
quality  of  its  liberty  and  progress  depend  upon  the  degree  and  quality 
of  the  common  intelligence.  This  diffusion  of  colleges  among  the  people 
necessitates  many  that  are  comparatively  poor  and  rural.  It  is  true  that 
at  the  metropolitan  gatherings  of  the  alumni  of  the  great  schools,  in  their 
after-supper  speeches,  made  amid  a  superabundance  of  wines  and  cigars, 
we  hear  much  belauding  of  the  great  schools,  and,  not  infrequently, 
much  belittling  of  "fresh  water,"  "one-horse"  colleges,  as  they  are 
termed.  While  the  importance  and  even  necessity  of  great  institutions, 
with  immense  resources  and  manifold  appliances,  is  freely,  gladly  granted, 
yet  the  highest  type  of  schools  does  not  necessarily  depend  upon  such 
costly  equipments.  The  best  culture  comes  from  the  unconscious  tuition 
given  by  the  tone  and  spirit  permeating  the  school,  productive  not  simply 
of  scholarly  adepts,  but  productive  of  a  purposeful  training  that  leads 
each  to  make  the  best  possible  of  himself  in  all  respects,  thereby  getting 
the  best  possible  preparation  to  meet  the  struggles  for  existence  and  to 
win  success. 

Professor  Huxley  well  says:  "Our  great  schools  are  fast  becoming 
schools  of  manners  for  the  rich,  of  sports  for  the  athletic,  hotbeds  of 
hypercritical  refinement,  most  destructive  to  originality,  whose  students 
do  a  little  learning  and  much  boating.  Not  a  few  of  our  most  expen- 
sively educated  youth  regard  athletic  sports  as  the  one  conceivable  mode 
of  enjoying,  of  spending,  leisure."  A  mother  of  a  recent  graduate  from 
one  of  our  leading  ball  and  boating  universities,  said  to  me  that  her  son 
was  so  zealously  engaged  in  developing  muscle  while  in  college  that  he 
forgot  to  study,  but  since  graduation  he  was  seriously  contemplating 
taking  up  that  long-neglected  occupation,  and,  in  fact,  had  made  some 
little  headway  already  in  the  matter.     A  father  recently  said  of  his  son, 


336  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

now  in  a  similar  institution,  he  knew  not  whether  he  should  receive  back 
a  man,  or  a  golden  calf,  as  he  was  spending  money  enough  on  him  to 
make  a  good-sized  animal  of  that  kind,  and  he  heard  from  his  son  no 
talk  about  his  studies,  but  all  about  his  games. 

Saying  nothing  of  the  drunkenness  and  the  rowdyism,  if  the  money 
that  changes  hands  in  these  games,  by  the  various  processes  best  known 
to  sporting  men,  having  added  thereto  the  money  worse  than  squandered 
in  promoting  good  fellowship  and  good  cheer  in  the  secret  fraternities, 
with  their  frivolous  secrets,  puerile  rites,  and  clannish  proclivities,  which 
infest  as  a  dry  rot  some  of  these  institutions,  could  be  distributed  among 
the  poorer  institutions  for  the  benefit  of  needy  students,  it  would  light  up 
the  intellectual  skies  with  a  new  glory.  It  would  come  to  a  class  the 
great  body  of  whom  are  students  indeed,  who  do  not  make  of  college 
life  simply  a  "right  jolly  good  time,"  but  a  time  for  earnest,  careful  prep- 
aration for  future  usefulness,  and  to  whom  study  is  a  sacramental  act, 
seeking  therein  both  ennoblement  and  equipment  for  leadership  in  the 
world's  work.  The  grandest  thing  in  student  life,  as  everywhere  else,  is 
right  manly  living  and  doing,  seeking  to  carve  out  for  themselves  noble 
destinies,  thereby  awakening  in  their  associates  all  that  is  worthiest. 
With  such  no  time  or  power  is  suffered  to  run  to  waste.  All  low  and 
frivolous  impulses  are  subjected  to  the  behests  of  high  aims. 

College  authorities,  as  a  whole,  disapprove  of  much  of  these  bad 
elements,  seeking,  rather,  to  promote  "plain  living  and  high  thinking;" 
but  they  find  themselves  largely  powerless  to  check  these  growing  evils. 
Every  institution,  great  or  small,  can,  however,  furnish  abundant  exam- 
ples of  failure.  There  are  sent  to  these  college  mills  all  sorts  of  grain, 
good,  shriveled,  sprouted,  musty,  decaying,  cockle,  chess,  darnel;  and  woe 
to  these  mills  if  they  do  not  return  to  their  patrons  at  least  triple  X 
roller-process  flour  for  the  same. 

The  smaller  colleges  are,  nevertheless,  fortunate  in  having  a  less  ratio 
of  this  kind  of  grists  sent  to  them  than  the  larger.  While  the  law  of 
selection  for  the  latter  is  largely  money,  for  the  former  the  great  struggle 
for  existence  and  survival  of  the  fittest  comes  in,  resulting  in  making 
the  ratio  of  such  students  as  rely  on  their  own  energies  to  win  their  way 
much  greater  in  the  small  rural  colleges,  and  giving  to  them  a  higher 
tone  and  atmosphere  of  purposeful  living  and  studying.  The  Faculties  of 
some  of  the  larger  schools  are  glad  to  get  a  good  sprinkling  of  such  as 
make  up  the  great  body  in  the  rural  schools,  as  leaven  for  their  large 
unmotived  masses,  as  salt  to  season  and  savor  the  play  elements. 

As  a  natural,  logical  consequence,  the  same  principles  and  laws  obtain 


SERMONS.  337 

in  life's  work  and  fierce  conflicts,  as  in  the  preparation.  As  the  majority 
of  the  preachers  of  the  gospel  come,  not  from  the  large  and  wealthy 
churches,  but  from  the  smaller  and  poor,  so  likewise  the  ratio  of  minis- 
ters, missionaries,  heralds  of  reform,  is  much  greater  from  the  graduates 
of  the  smaller  than  from  the  large  and  wealthy  colleges.  The  same 
holds  true  in  all  the  rugged,  self-forgetting,  self-sacrificing  pursuits  of  life. 
The  great  majority  of  the  graduates  from  these  rural  colleges  go  forth 
with  all  their  equipments  gathered  in  hand  for  achievement.  Thus  def- 
initely purposed,  they  carry  a  wonderful  earnestness  and  vigor  into  life. 
They  forge  ahead  wherever  brawn,  and  nerve,  and  self-reliance,  and  energy, 
and  sacrifice  are  required.     .     . 

A  leading  lawyer  of  New  York  City  recently  informed  me  that  among 
the  numerous  students,  from  time  to  time,  in  the  office  of  his  firm,  those 
from  the  smaller  rural  colleges  set  about  their  law  studies  as  if  they 
meant  business.  They  stuck  to  the  law,  and  the  law  stuck  to  them, 
while  those  from  the  big  schools  didn't  stick  to  the  law,  nor  did  the  law 
stick  to  them.  .  .  .  Those  of  you  who  were  at  the  recent  alumni 
dinner  at  Alfred,  doubtless  recollect  the  post-prandial  speech  of  one  of 
your  number,  who  has  risen  to  distinguished  eminence  in  his  profession 
in  the  city  of  New  York,  in  which  he  stated  that,  when  he  first  went  to 
the  city,  he  regretted  that  he  was  not  a  graduate  of  some  noted,  popular 
college;  but  after  years  of  observation  and  of  association  with  graduates 
from  most  colleges  of  this  and  other  countries,  and  finding  that  the  ratio 
of  Alfred  students  coming  to  the  front  in  the  various  callings  and  pur- 
suits was  greater  than  from  any  other  college, he  had  long  since  not  only 
ceased  to  regret,  but  had  come  to  be  proud  and  to  rejoice  that  he  was  an 
Alfred  graduate.  To  the  same  effect  was  the  remark  of  another,  on  a 
different  occasion,  that,  on  seeing  how  those  who  left  Alfred  for  other 
schools  got  on  in  the  world,  in  comparison  with  those  who  remained,  he 
had  nothing  to  regret  that  he  remained. 

Newly  sheep-skinned  collegians  are  not  infrequently  afflicted  with  the 
weakness  of  being  vain  of  the  fineness  of  the  wool  of  these  skins,  or  of 
the  distinguished  names  appended  thereto ;  but  they  soon  learn  to  their 
dismay  that  the  world  cares  not  a  whistle  for  these  things;  nor,  as  to 
that  matter,  about  the  fineness  of  their  own  wool;  nor  whether  the  bluest 
of  blue  blood  courses  their  veins  or  not;  nor  about  the  distinguished 
names  that  may  or  may  not  be  found  in  their  ancestral  line;  nor  about 
the  aristocratic  airs  assumed  by  sappy  young  brains  of  both  genders, 
sometimes  even  by  older  brains,  begotten  of  codfish,  petroleum,  shoddy, 
stocks,  or  what  not;   but  that  it  sets  great  store  by  one  who,  fighting. 


338  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

unaided,  his  way  up  through  all  his  preparation  for  life,  has  learned  to 
stand  squarely  on  his  feet,  strike  straight  from  the  shoulder;  or,  being 
down,  is  on  his  feet  again  before  the  world  or  himself  knows  of  his  fall; 
and,  instead  of  cowardly  conservatism,  or  hesitantly  waiting  for  something 
to  turn  up,  or  for  fair  weather  and  smooth  seas  to  come,  has  acquired  that 
unyielding,  all-enduring  fortitude  in  adversity,  that  dauntless,  all-daring, 
heroic  spirit  so   essential   for  leadership,  or  the  accomplishment  of  any 

great  work. 

"A  ruddy  drop  of  manly  blood 
The  surging  seas  outweighs." 

We  heard  a  prisoner  in  the  late  war  say  to  his  fellow-prisoners 
that  the  next  time  he  went  to  war,  he  was  going  in  a  buggy.  It  would 
enable  him  to  keep  at  a  safe  distance  from  bullets  and  chances  of  capture, 
and  secure  nice  attentions  as  he  drove  up  to  hotels  o'  nights.  It  is  too 
much  the  aspiration  of  students  to  so  prepare  themselves  as  to  be 
enabled  to  go  forth  in  buggies,  with  gloved  and  caned  hands,  to  the  bat- 
tles of  life,  at  safe  distances  from  ball  and  saber  strokes.  The  character 
of  the  preparatory  training  determines  largely  the  efficiency  and  success 
with  which  the  duties  of  after  life  will  be  performed.  Right  and  effective 
culture  secures  power  as  well  as  finish,  leads  to  aspiration,  consecration, 
and  earnest,  purposeful  work. 

In  these  recent  times,  to  meet  the  wants  of  such  as  do  not  have,  or 
do  not  desire,  the  benefits  of  ordinary  college  culture,  universities, 
so  called,  have  been  placed  on  wheels,  and,  with  their  Lilliputian  distrib- 
uting carts,  peddle  from  door  to  door,  like  the  milkman,  knowledge  by 
the  quart  or  pint,  to  suit  customers;  or,  if  preferred,  the}-  furnish  it  in 
wholesale  quantities  at  wholesale  prices  in  quick  time,  amid  great 
throngs,  at  pleasant  summer  resorts. 

This  is  all  good  in  its  way,  meets  needs  that  could  not  otherwise  be 
so  well  met,  awakens  appetite,  cultivates  a  taste  for  something  more  and 
better,  and  redeems  much  time  that  would  otherwise  run  to  waste,  or 
worse.  But  this  is  not  culture  in  the  highest  and  best  sense.  To  get 
this  one  must  needs  be  withdrawn  from  the  noise  and  cares  of  the  world 
into  mental  atmospheres,  with  steady,  long-continued  drill,  amid  the 
inspirations  of  other  minds  engaged  in  the  same  pursuits.  In  order  to 
furnish  these  conditions  the  college  is  essential. 

The  motive  inspiring  and  guiding  in  the  founding,  supporting,  and 
conducting  these  sources  of  human  enlightenment  and  progress,  has  never 
been  the  acquisition  of  wealth  or  power  or  personal  fame,  but  a  sincere 
desire  to  better  the  world's  condition.  They  have  had  and  still  have 
many  a  hero,  prophet,  and  martyr,  in  the  pursuit  and  the  defense  of  truth. 


SERMONS.  339 

whose  pen  or  voice  has  moved  bis  age,  whose  lead  has  guided  the  peo- 
ple to  higher  planes,  whose  influence  has  shaped  the  ages,  widening  and 
ennobling  human  destiny.  These  rqen  have  been  undeviated  by  love  of 
ease,  dread  of  labor,  desire  of  wealth,  greatness  of  difficulties,  fear  of 
consequences,  but  have  responded  to  the  voice  of  conscience,  the  claims 
of  duty,  the  responsibilities  of  station,  with  an  unselfish  devotion.  They 
have  been  animated  by  the  conviction  that  the  discover}-  or  dissemina- 
tion of  truth,  the  advancement  of  knowledge  in  any  direction,  or  the 
enlightenment  of  mind,  contributes  to  the  advancement  and  welfare  of 
all;  that  a  consecrated  life  is  the  first  and  highest  duty;  that  self-devotion 
outranks  mere  scholarship;  that  faith  lighted  by  knowledge,  good  will, 
bearing  fruit  in  good  deeds,  is  the  aim  and  end  of  college  culture. 

Such  being  the  manifold  indebtedness  of  the  world  to  teachers  and 
institutions  of  learning,  it  follows  not  only  as  a  legitimate  but  necessary 
corollary  that,  in  proportion  as  the  world  recognizes  this  indebtedness 
and  responds  to  its  claims  by  aiding  these  institutions,  will  it  aid  and 
benefit  itself  Money  given  in  this  aid  is  best  saved,  treasured,  and  mul- 
tiplied, some  thirty,  some  sixty,  some  an  hundred-fold.  Wealth  con- 
fided to  such  public  trusts  is  safe  as  far  as  anything  human  can  be  safe. 
Here  neither  private  extravagance  can  squander,  nor  personal  necessity 
exhaust  it,  nor  will  it  perish  with  the  life  that  gathered  it.  Here,  uncon- 
sumed  itself,  it  will  perpetually  feed,  not  the  material  nature  of  man,  that 
so  soon  passes  away,  but  the  hunger  of  the  unperishing  mind,  continu- 
ing thus  to  do  good  for  untold  years  after  the  donor  himself  has  passed 
on.  The  names  of  such  benefactors  have  ever  been  held  in  special  honor, 
their  memories  cherished  with  special  affection  and  gratitude. 

John  Harvard,  an  alumnus  of  that  "acorn,"  Emanuel  College,  dying 
young  and  comparatively  unknown,  bequeathed  one-half  of  his  property, 
some  ^4,000,  and  his  library,  to  the  founding  of  a  college,  that  was  in 
gratitude  named  after  him.  Who  knows  or  cares  what  became  of  the 
other  half?  But  this  half  started  streams  of  influences  which  have  per- 
meated the  land,  kindled  a  light  which  has  shone  over  the  continent,  and 
after  nearly  two  and  a  half  centuries  there  is  no  name  which  that  institution 
cherishes  with  more  gratitude,  or  is  seeking  to  honor  more  highly,  than 
the  name  of  John  Harvard. 

The  true  glory  of  man  is  not  the  glory  that  blazes  about  him  as  he 
lives,  but  that  glory  which,  enduring  after  he  has  himself  passed  out  of 
sight,  is  seen  and  acknowledged  by  benefited  and  grateful  after  genera- 
tions. Such  is  the  glory  of  those  of  whom  in  those  long  after  ages — 
when,  perhaps,  it  cannot  be  said  with  certainty  that  their  blood  flows  in 


340  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

the  veins  of  any  living  person — it  can  be  said  that  their  bounty  helps 
with  undiminished  supply  innumerable  multitudes.  Such  is  specially 
and  emphatically  true  of  all  who  aid  in  building  and  supporting  colleges. 

Alfred  has  just  celebrated  its  first  semicentennial.  When  it  gathers 
in  the  prime  of  maturing  strength  to  celebrate  its  thousandth  anniversary, 
what  names  think  you  will  be  called  up  with  the  most  grateful  remem- 
brance? The  starred  names  of  its  catalogues  will  then  doubtless  repre- 
sent many  whose  standing  in  the  community,  when  and  where  they  lived, 
whose  fortunes  and  public  services  placed  them,  in  the  estimation  of  their 
day,  high  in  rank  and  influence;  butthetenderest  and  most  grateful  mem- 
ories will  gather  about  those  who,  in  far-off  past  years,  gave  of  their  lives 
and  their  fortunes  to  its  founding  and  support,  starting  thus  a  perennial 
stream,  which,  watering  all  its  roots  and  fructifying  and  fruiting  through 
all  those  years,  will  then  be  just  as  nourishing  and  fruit-producing  as  at 
the  beginning.  It  is  to  the  merit  of  those  who  lead  in  such  enterprises 
that  they  lay  foundations  on  which  others  of  kindred  temper  coming 
after  may  build,  and  awaken  a  spirit  which  may  lead  to  services  more 
important  even  than  their  own. 

Alfred,  starting  as  a  little  taper  set  in  .an  upper  window,  becoming 
soon  a  candle,  lighting  in  its  small  way  the  path  of  many  an  earnest 
pilgrim  to  its  shrine  of  knowledge,  thence  developed  gradually  into  a 
candelabrum,  many  lighted.  As  it  has  been  the  solicitude  and  care- 
encumbered  effort  of  its  founders  and  supporters,  so  let  it  continue  to  be 
ours  to  keep  these  lights  trimmed  and  supplied  with  oil  and  brightly 
burning,  as  untiringly  and  as  religiously  as  were  those  sacred  lamps  in 
the  golden  candlestick  of  the  temple  at  Jerusalem.  We  need  have  no 
fear  that  the  time  will  come  when  our  Alma  Mater,  whose  memory  and 
interests  we  have  this  evening  gathered  to  cherish,  will  be  .less  an  object 
of  affection  and  care  to  our  children's  children  to  her  thousandth  birth- 
day and  onward,  than  she  is  this  evening  to  us.  Let  us  therefore  con- 
tinue to  multiply  and  brighten  her  lights,  in  the  full  assurance  that,  when 
we  have  done  what  we  can,  coming  generations  will  take  up  and  augment 
the  good  work.  As  none  of  us  will  pass  this  way  again,  after  once  hav- 
ing taken  our  departure  from  the  earth,  it  behooves  us  one  and  all  to 
make  the  best  and  most  enduring  use  of  life,  for  blessing,  not  only  our 
own  age,  but  likewise  all  future  ages. 


SERMONS.  341 


PERSONALITY. 

[Baccalaureate  sermon,  delivered  June  26,  18S7,  before  the  graduating  class  of  Alfred 
University.] 

"I  Am."     Ex.  3  :  14. 

Jehovah,  in  announcing  himself  to  Moses,  from  out  the  burning  bush, 
used,  as  the  source  of  his  name,  the  highest  language  symbol  possible  to 
be  formulated,  expressive  of  personality.  "I  Am,"  incapable  of  being 
defined  by  any  higher  or  simpler  term,  is  the  ultimate  affirmation  of 
being  as  person.  Jehovah,  therefore,  in  announcing  that  he  was  the  I 
Am,  declared  the  essential  characteristic  of  his  being  to  be  personality. 

I.  The  Essential  Nature  and  Matiife stations  of  Personality. — Life 
is  the  essence  of  spirit.  Livingness,  energy,  or  essential  activity, 
is  its  manifestation.  Self-consciousness  is  the  primary  attribute  of  per- 
sonality. When  a  finite  being  stands  revealed  to  himself  in.  the  clear, 
self-seeing,  and  spontaneous  assurance,"!  am  I,"  he  has  his  conscious 
birth  into  the  kingdom  of  personalities.  As,  by  sense-consciousness, 
man  is  connected  with  the  world  physical,  so,  by  self-consciousness,  he  is 
connected  with  the  world  spiritual.  He  is  thereby  not  only  separated 
from  the  world  and  its  forces,  but  he  likewise  emerges  from  animal  or 
brute  consciousness,  wherein  "I,"  or  personality,  has  no  place.  Thus  he 
is  raised  out  of  the  material  world,  lifted  above  his  animal  nature,  and  his 
manhood  as  person  inaugurated. 

This  self-seeing  spirit  life  manifests  itself  as  reason,  sensibility,  and 
will.  This  self-conscious  life,  as  reason,  apprehends  realities,  truth, 
beauty,  goodness,  illuminates  with  ideas,  transfigures  with  ideals,  beholds 
the  supersensible,  the  unchangeable,  the  absolute.  As  sensibility,  it  is 
the  fountain  of  the  spiritual. sentiments,  love,  sympathy,  compassion,  pity, 
admiration,  reverence,  adoration.  As  will,  it  is  power  of  self-originant, 
self-determined  activity. 

Personality,  therefore,  as  self-conscious  knowing,  is  the  source  of  wis- 
dom ;  as  self-conscious  feeling,  is  the  source  of  ethical  and  theistic  senti- 
ments; as  self-conscious  willing,  is  self-originant  cause.  In  the  light  of 
reason,  under  the  spring  of  motive,  born  of  the  sensibility,  with  freedom 
of  will  in  the  choice  of  ends,  it  starts  new  streams  of  activity. 

Deity  is  perfect  person,  unconditioned  and  absolute  power,  self- 
originant,  self-directive,  and  infinite  cause.  Man,  in  these,  is  relative, 
finite,  conditioned,  dependent,  and  imperfect;  yet  in  his  conscious  self- 
hood he  has  assurance  of  personal  identity  with  its  unity  and  continuity 


342  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

<:)f  activit}-,amid  all  changes  of  physical  forces  and  phenomena,  and  assur- 
ance of  the  accountability  and  immortality  of  this  personality.  These 
are  all  essential  attributes  of  personality.  Subtract  either  one,  and  the 
residuum  is  something  less  than  person. 

2.  Absolute  Personality  as  Creator. — Deity,  in  his  transcendent  per- 
sonality, is  absolv'ed  from  all  relations  and  conditions  save  as  self-imposed 
in  a  finite  creation.  He  originates  in  his  reason  all  truths  and  ideals. 
These  truths  become  laws  for  directing  his  will,  whereby  these  ideals  are 
embodied  and  filled  out  in  the  objective  realities,  by  his  all-pervading 
energy.  His  indwelling  presence  and  power  are  thus  omnipresent, 
omnipotent,  persistent,  and  unchangeable,  amid  all  the  manifoldness  of 
its  manifestations.  It  gives  order,  uniformity,  diversity,  and  beauty  to 
universal  nature.  This  divine  efficiency,  as  force,  planted  out  in  space, 
becomes  substance,  held  in  stable  equilibrium,  whereby  all  points  in  this 
substance  are  balanced  by  action  and  reaction;  it  becomes  matter,  with 
its  manifoldness  of  phenomena,  holding  its  attributes  in  a  firm  impenetra- 
bility against  all  other  like  matter,  yet  permeable  by  higher  forces.  The 
divine  life-efficiency,  in  the  ascending  scale  of  creation,  using  each  lower 
form  as  a  matrix  for  a  higher,  lends  out  and  individualizes  innumerable 
centers  of  delegated  life,  which,  in  the  ascent,  becomes  more  and  more 
individualized,  with  the  self-centering  unity  of  organic  impulse  and  inher- 
ence, impenetrable  by  other  like  life  unities,  and  capable  of  utilizing  the 
lower  forces.  These  grow  more  and  more  complex,  specialized,  pliable, 
full  of  office  and  function,  through  vegetal  and  animal,  till,  at  the  highest 
extreme,  they  emerge  in  the  human,  of  which  they  are  the  prophecy  and 
the  endeavor.  The  human  is  lifted  infinitely  higher,  by  being  imbued 
with  .spirit  or  personality,  separate  from  the  divine  personality,  but  not 
from  the  divine  imminence.  All  nature  is  the  direct  outcome  and 
expression  of  divine  wisdom  and  power,  in  a  perpetual  generation  of 
energy,  welling  up  in  a  ceaseless  stream  of  force  and  life  and  act,  contin- 
uously unfolding  into  realities,  its  laws  being  but  the  uniform  activities  of 
the  divine  will,  lighted  by  ideas,  guided  by  purpose.  The  uni\-erse  is  an 
organism,  used  as  a  pliable  instrumentality  by  the  ever-present  and  ever- 
working  God,  conscious  where  it  is  unconscious,  seeing  where  it  is  blind, 
imparting  life  in  universal  being,  begetting  it,  in  the  everlivingness  of  his 
own  Spirit,  in  all  finite  spirits.  Subtract  any  of  the  essentials  of  person- 
ality from  Deity,  and  the  residuum  gives  a  soulless  universe  as  the 
"residuary  legatee,"  and  Deity  becomes  the  semi-vital  demiurge  of  the 
ancients,  or  the  unconscious  somewhat,  as  the  unknown  and  unknowable 
power  of  the  moderns,  whose  laws  bind  him  down  like  chains  of  adamant, 


SERMONS.  343 

a  formless  impersonation    of  physical    force,  that    lies    imprisoned    and 
crushed  under  the  universe. 

3.  Whence  Has  Man  His  Personality  ^ — The  personality  of  God,  the 
Father,  gives  personality  to  man,  his  child.  The  Fatherhood  of  God 
and  the  childship  of  man  constitute  the  very  essence  of  human  existence, 
determining  the  nature  of  this  existence,  tlie  character  of  its  ongoing  in 
the  individual  and  in  the  race,  and  the  plan  and  character  of  human 
redemption  through  Christ.  Whatever  is  the  nature  of  God,  such  must 
be  that  of  the  human  spirit,  being  after  his  nature  and  in  his  likeness. 
As  the  likeness  of  the  earthly  parent  is  reproduced  in  the  child,  not  so 
much  in  form  and  feature  as  in  the  inner  and  more  essential  nature,  of 
which  the  outward  is  but  a  manifestation,  so  the  likeness  of  God  in  man 
is  in  his  spiritual  essence  and  its  attributes,  in  his  personality.  It  is  this 
oneness  of  nature  that  gives  ability  for  inter-communication  and  com- 
munion, whereby  God  is  able  to  reveal  himself  to  man,  and  man  is  able 
to  apprehend  and  love  God.  Man,  thus,  instead  of  "son  of  matter,"  is 
"son  of  God,"  with 

"This  main  miracle,  that  thou  art  thou. 
With  power  on  thine"own  act,  and  on  the  world." 

4.  TJic  Human  Soul. — Man,  however,  is  not  pure  spirit,  but  ensouled, 
incarnated  spirit.  Soul  is  the  vital,  organic  connection  between  spirit  and 
body  in  this  embodiment.  It  is  the  organ  for  the  spirit,  as  the  body  is  the 
organ  for  it.  Justin  Martyr  well  calls  the  body  the  house  of  the  soul, 
and  the  soul  the  house  of  the  spirit.  Paul  represents  the  quick  and 
powerful  word  of  God  as  piercing  and  dividing  between  soul  and  body, 
as  a  living  organism  is  divided.  Spirit  is  born  of  spirit,  flesh  of  flesh. 
Soul  is  the  union  of  the  two  in  a  neutral  third.  Spirit  is  the  inbreathing 
of  the  divine  into  this  soulish  or  animal  nature.  Spirit  is  personal,  soul 
impersonal.  Mind  is  the  manifestation  of  ensouled  thence  of  embodied 
spirit.    Without  the  indwelling  spirit,  soul  would  not  be  human,  but  brute. 

On  his  spiritual  side  man  is  partaker  of  the  divine  nature;  on  his  soul- 
ish side  he  is,  as  Wickliffe  puts  it,  "beastlie."  Developing  inward  and 
upward,  man  is  spiritual;  developing  downward  and  outward,  through 
the  bodily  organism,  he  is  animal.  Man  is  thus  made  a  little  lower  than 
the  angels,  clothed  upon  and  underpropped  by  a  nature  little  above  the 
brute.  Man,  in  common  with  the  vegetable,  possesses  somatic  or  bodily 
life;  in  common  with  the  animal,  he  possesses  soulish  or  animal  life, 
forming  a  matrix  for  implanting  the  life  of  the  spirit.  God  is  the  father 
of  spirits,  not  of  souls  or  bodies.     These  are  but  the  organs  or  living 


344 


LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 


instrumentalities  for  the  spirit's  worldward  activities.  This  lifts  the 
soulish  bodily  organism  from  the  plane  of  simple  animal  up  into  an 
organism  for  the  embodiment  of  spirit,  even  a  temple  for  the  divine 
Spirit.  "What?  know  ye  not,"  inquires  Paul,  "that  your  body  is  the 
temple  of  the  Holy  Gho.st,  which  is  in  you,  which  ye  have  from  God?" 
This  temple  thus  transcends  all  temples  made  by  man,  however  costly  in 
material,  magnificently  planned,  or  skillfully  constructed, — a  temple  with 
its  holy  of  holies  for  the  indwelling  of  the  divine. 

5.  The  Human  Organ  for  the  Divine. — Humanity,  thus,  through  its 
divine  kinship,  is  the  organ  for  divine  indwelling,  and  for  revelations  to 
illume  the  spirit,  inspirations  to  enkindle  and  empower,  imperatives 
imposing  oughtness,  and  motives  for  accomplishing  the  highest  end  of 
being.  Conscience, "  the  associate-knowing- with-God"  faculty,  is  capacity 
for  receiving  assurance  that  God  is,  and  through  which  the  human  gives 
response  to  the  divine,  being  thus  the  medium  of  a  living  intercourse 
between  God  and  man.  Conscience  thus  acting  is  faith-faculty  or  God- 
consciousness.  As,  through  the  sense-consciousness,  man  sees  the 
world  and  himself  in  it,  so  through  conscience  there  comes  to  the  spir- 
itual minded  the  assurance  that  the  supreme  power  to  which  the  human 
spirit  is  con'elated  and  dependent,  is  God,  the  living  Father.  This  faith 
assurance  becomes  a  constantly  renewed  spiritual  experience,  the  source 
of  all  spiritual  light,  knowledge,  power,  and  deed. 

While  faith  gives  assurance  that  God  is,  the  reason  apprehends 
what  he  is.  It  sees  him  as  absolute  in  his  self-existence,  infinite  in  his 
nature,  perfect  in  the  attributes  of  personality,  standing  out  from  nothing- 
ness by  his  own  inherent  energy,  spontaneous,  free,  the  source  of  all, 
supreme  over  all.  This  intuitive  apprehension  of  God,  who,  though 
incomprehensible  in  the  fullness  of  his  infinitudes,  becomes  thereby  the 
most  positive  and  consistent  apprehension  of  which  the  human  mind  is 
capable,  lying  clear  and  distinct  in  the  consciousness,  satisfying  at  once 
the  demands  of  faith,  of  reason,  and  of  the  religious  sentiments.  Faith, 
reason,  and  religious  experience  blend  in  the  assurance  that  God  not  only 
is,  but  that  he  is  also  a  living,  condescending,  forgiving,  consoling,  and 
helping  Father. 

Conscience  has  a  twofold  function.  It  gives  not  only  faith  assurance, 
but  likewise  announces  imperatives,  enforcing  the  behests  of  law,  and 
awakening  the  consciousness  of  obligation.  In  its  Godward  affinities  it 
is  receptivity  of  divine  life  and  light,  or  faith  proper;  in  its  responsive- 
ness to  imperatives,  enforcing  law,  it  is  conscience  proper.  As  such,  it  is 
the  voice  of  God  in  the  spirit,  announcing  and  enforcing  the  imperatives 


SERMONS.  345 

of  universal  and  absolute  law,  whose  harmonies  as  they  sweep  and  swell 
through  the  universe  become  mandates  which  all  lower  nature  must  obey, 
and  which  all  personalities  ought  to  obey. 

6.  TJic  Ultimate  End  of  Human  Action. — Personality  has,  in  addition 
to  the  attributes  already  enumerated,  power  of  self-directive  activity, 
capability  of  choosing  an  end  under  an  imperative  and  imposing  law  for 
controlling  this  activity  in  securing  this  end.  Man  thus  becomes,  in  this 
free  disposing,  self-regnant  over  his  activities,  subject  only  to  this  impera- 
tive. The  most  important  question  in  ethics  is,  "What  is  the  ultimate 
end  in  view  of  which  this  imperative  imposes  obligation?"  There  may 
be  intermediate  ends,  but  there  must  also  be  an  ultimate  one,  to  which 
these  are  means.  This  must  be  the  same  for  all  men,  with  a  like  impera- 
tive, obligation,  and  umpire  for  all,  giving,  thereby,  unity  in  the  ethical 
nature  of  humanity,  the  same  universal  law  of  duty,  and  a  uniform  stand- 
ard of  character.  From  this  unity  spring  the  convictions  of  mutual  duty 
and  accountability  of  each  to  all,  and  of  all  to  each,  and  all  to  God,  the 
Father  of  all. 

7.  The  Supreme  Good. — An  end  involves  some  kind  of  good  to  be 
attained,  and  the  ultimate  end  involves  the  supreme  good.  A  good  may 
be  to  the  end  of  gratifying  some  instinct,  appetite,  or  propensity;  hence 
there  may  be  as  many  objective  goods  as  there  are  desires  to  gratify.  But 
these  goods  may  be  so  correlated  to  conscious  personality  as  to  conduce 
to  subjective  good,  and  thus  be  means  to  this  good. 

The  Hedonistic  theory  makes  the  greatest  happiness  of  being  the 
supreme  good,  and  thus  develops  right  from  happiness,  thereby  making 
right  simply  a  thing  of  expediency,  of  trade  and  barter  in  utilities  to 
gratify  a  craving  of  the  sentient  nature.  That  end  is  most  worthy  which 
will  give  the  greatest  happiness,  either  in  quantity,  quality,  intensity,  or 
durability,  that  the  highest  rule  of  right  which  guides  to  this,  and  that 
the  best  motive  which  furnishes  the  strongest  spring  to  action,  leading  to 
it.  Ignoring  the  imperative  to  do  right  regardless  of  the  consequent 
happiness  or  misery,  it  makes  right  the  expedient,  and  the  useful  becomes 
the  guide;  and,  the  motive  being  selfish,  the  action  fails  to  give  happiness, 
because  it  fails  in  virtue.  The  rectitude  theory  either  confounds  laws  and 
ends,  or  else  ignores  ends,  saying,  "Do  right  because  it  is  right,  and  that 
is  the  end  of  it." 

The  theory  of  perfection  of  personality  holds  that  the  highest  imper- 
ative demands,  the  highest  motive  prompts,  and  the  highest  reason  sees 
the  perfection  of  all  personalities  to  be  the  essential  and  supreme  good. 
God  is  the  absolutely  perfect  personality,  and  the  universe  was  created 


346  LIKE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

for  the  express  purpose  of  imaging  his  infinite  perfections  in  finite  per- 
sonaUties,  who,  with  their  limitations  and  imperfections,  are  to  the  end  of 
perpetually  growing  more  and  more  into  these  divine  perfections.  Among 
the  excellencies  which  this  theory  possesses  above  the  others,  is  that  of 
having  the  purpose,  the  tendency  of  the  act,  the  ideal  end,  and  the  result- 
ing good,  all  coincide  and  realized.  This  is  the  supreme  good,  which  cre- 
ation and  its  ongoing,  which  all  lower  forms  of  good,  all  influences  and 
instrumentalities,  were  expressly  designed  to  aid.  All  working  for  this 
good  is  in  harmony  with  the  plans  and  purposes  of  God,  and  is,  there- 
fore, right  working.  Happiness,  though  not  in  itself  an  entity,  will  follow 
as  a  result,  will  accompany  as  a  shadow,  its  substance;  and,  as  God  is 
blessed  in  his  perfections,  so  man's  blessedness  will  increase  as  he 
advances  in  perfectness. 

8.  lV/i_y  Is  Perfection  the  Supreme  Good? — Personality,  embodying  all 
there  is  of  intrinsic  worth,  essential  excellency,  and  transcendent  dignity, 
is  eminently  worthy  of  this  supreme  good.  God,  as  perfect  personality, 
has  infinite  worth,  absolute  excellency,  and  supreme  dignity.  Finite 
spirits,  as  partakers  of  his  nature,  have  like,  though  relative,  limited,  and 
imperfect  qualities.  These  are  the  seal  of  man's  divine  sonship  and  the 
crowning  glory  of  his  being,  with  nothing  finite  beyond  or  above,  all  else 
being  lower  and  of  less  worth.  Personality,  possessing  thus  the  worth 
of  all  worths,  the  dignity  of  all  dignities,  seeking  holiness  or  spiritual 
perfection,  thereby  making  the  excellency  of  the  divine  character  to  pre- 
vail more  and  more  in  his  children,  is  the  work  of  supreme  worthiness. 

9.  The  Supreme  Imperative. — "Be  ye,  therefore,  perfect,  even  as  your 
Father  which  is  in  heaven  is  perfect" — this  is  the  supreme  imperative. 
Be  a  complete  person,  in  godlikeness,  and  seek  a  like  completeness  for 
all,  because  of  the  infinite  worthiness  of  the  worth  and  dignity  of  this 
heavenly  Father,  and  of  men,  his  children.  This  Shekinah  of  worthiness, 
shining  in  the  holy  of  holies  of  each  personality,  imposes  this  supreme 
imperative  of  holiness  or  spiritual  perfectness  on  all,  as  the  supreme  good. 
This  imperative  is  subjective,  simple,  immutable,  universal,  legislating  for, 
obliging,  judging,  rewarding  alike,  all  personalities.  It  is  grounded  in, 
and  springs  from,  the  consciousness  of  worth,  giving  worthiness  above 
all  pleasure  or  pain;  worthiness,  not  of  use  as  means  to  something  else, 
but  for  which  all  things  else  become  means.  This  imperative  is  ultimate 
law  to  conscience;  the  authoritative  determiner  of  how  activity  in  freedom 
should  be,  from  whose  approval  or  disapproval  there  is  no  appeal.  It 
likewise  awakens  motive  for  resisting  and  overcoming  all  opposing  and 
baffling  influences,  and  making  all  wants,  utilities,  and  lower  good  amen- 


SERMONS.  347 

able  to  its  behests.  Obedience  to  its  mandates  exalts  the  spirit  more  and 
more  into  the  divine  perfections,  thereby  securing  spiritual  complacency 
or  blessedness,  and  the  divine  approval,  with  that  of  all  like  motived 
spirits.  The  imperative  to  act  worthy  of  the  spirit's  worth  is  law  to  all, 
and  holds  all  responsible  to  likewise  act  worthy  of  the  worthiness  of  all, 
to  the  end  of  the  holiness  and  consequent  blessedness  of  all.  This  gives 
an  ethical  system,  every  way  complete  and  inclusive  of  all  duties  under 
its  universal  and  reciprocal  law;  do  that  and  that  only  which  is  due  to 
self  and  all  other  personalities,  without  infringement  upon  the  freedom  of 
others  in  their  compliance  with  the  same  law.  By  obedience  to  this  law 
each  sustains  his  own  and  contributes  to  universal  personal  worthiness. 
All  things  else  were  created  with  the  design  of  working  together  for  the 
good  of  spirit,  and  to  be  in  perpetual  allegiance  to  its  sovereignty,  and 
controlled  and  guided  by  and  for  it. 

The  conscious  assurance  of  this  supreme  worth  of  spirit  not  only 
imposes  imperative,  but  also  awakens  love  of  this  excellency,  thereby 
furnishing  a  spring,  not  simply  to  mutual  obligation,  but  also  to  mutual 
good  will.  This  universal  benevolence  inspires  each  to  seek,  not  merely 
the  happiness  of  each  and  all,  but  the  completeness,  wholeness,  holiness 
of  each  and  all.  All  the  good  approve  and  love  all  the  good  for  their 
worthiness'  sake.  This  reciprocal  approval  and  good  will  are  the  source 
of  all  spiritual  fellowship,  and  spring  to  mutual  helpfulness  in  uplifting, 
enlightening,  strengthening,  leading,  upbuilding  each  and  all. 

Responsive  to  this  imperative  and  to  this  good  will,  there  is  a  divinely 
implanted  aspiration  in  every  normally  conditioned  individual,  for  perfect- 
ing his  being,  to  become  a  complete  person,  and  to  aid  others  to  become 
the  same.  The  imagination,  awakened  by  this  aspiration,  forms  ideals  of 
what  personality  generically  should  be  when  perfected,  and  from  this 
generic  ideal  shapes  specific  ideals  for  individual  personalities.  This 
gives  motives  for  earnest  endeavor  to  attain  for  himself,  and  aid  others  in 
attaining,  this  ideal  good,  by  the  highest  activity  of  all  powers  in  their 
right  and  harmonious  relations  according  to  the  highest  laws  and  end  of 
being.  This  will  give  singleness  of  purpose,  decision,  vigor,  steadfastness 
in  self-control,  self-denial,  self-direction,  self-culture,  in  the  upbuilding  of 
a  complete  character,  proportional,  symmetrical,  harmonious.  To  this 
end  each  will  take  to  himself  as  helps,  making  them  a  part  of  his  being, 
truth,  law,  beauty,  the  spiritual  content  and  formative  influences  of  nature. 
As  God  is  the  perfect  embodiment  of  all  which  is  man's  highest  good, 
these  ideal  purposes  and  efforts  gather  and  blend  in  an  upward  aspira- 
tion, and  endeavor  to  progressively  approach  these  divine  perfections, — 


348  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

in  an  upward  flame  of  devotion  and  worship.  The  entire  being  is  conse- 
crated in  free  and  glad  surrender  to  the  joyous  doing  of  his  will,  thereby 
putting  himself  in  harmony  with  the  purposes  of  divine  love. 

10.  Religion,  or  the  Christ-life  in  Humanity. — Humanity  is  the  special 
organ  of  the  divine  life.  Christ,  in  his  incarnation,  re-ingenerated  this 
humanity,  lost  through  sin,  with  this  life.  He  came  as  the  Life  Giver,  the 
Healer.  He  becomes  thus  the  new  life  of  humanity  generically,  to 
become  specifically  the  new  life  to  each  one  accepting  him.  "  I  in  them ; 
the\'  in  me,"  and  thus  "he  that  hath  the  Son  hath  life" — the  eternal  or 
divine  life,  in  contradistinction  to  the  perishable  world-life.  This  divine 
human  life  becomes  the  life  of  every  regenerate  or  twice-born  person — 
born  of  God  through  Christ,  by  the  Spirit,  and  through  the  inspiration 
of  the  Spirit,  this  life  is  ever  growing,  ever  fructifying.  It  quickens  the 
conscience,  illumines  the  reason,  empowers  the  will,  sweetens  the  affec- 
tions, purifies  the  sentiments,  subdues  the  passions,  and  ennobles  the 
body.  It  thus  attunes  all  the  powers  harmoniously  and  symmetrically. 
It  is  the  source  of  all  spiritual  graces,  the  inspiration  to  all  labor.  It 
lifts  above  temptation.  Instead  of  the  outward  restraints  of  mere  legality, 
wherein  all  virtue  is  meclTanical  and  punctilious,  resulting,  at  best,  in  self- 
poised  tranquillit}^,  it  produces  a  life  where  all  selfism  disappears,  and  the 
checks  of  law  are  no  more  felt,  being  superseded  by  the  higher  and  more 
positive  power  of  love,  wherein  all  is  devoted,  sacrificial,  inspirational. 
This  inspirational  life  has  a  twofold  manifestation — in  the  graces  of  char- 
acter— love,  joy,  peace,  long-suffering,  gentleness,  goodness,  faith,  meek- 
ness, temperance,  modified  by  varying  individualites,  and  in  the  develop- 
ment of  powers,  giving  diversities  of  gifts — to  one  wisdom,  to  others 
knowledge,  healing,  prophesying,  discerning  of  spirits,  or  gift  of  tongues 
— all  by  the  same  spirit.  Thus  inspired,  enlightened,  motived,  beauti- 
fied, perfected,  made  holy,  life  becomes  full  of  the  efficiency  of  faith 
working  by  love,  noble,  sublime. 

II.  The  Respect  and  Reverence  Due  to  Personality. — The  name 
Jehovah,  representing  Deity  as  the  I  Am,  was  considered  by  the  Hebrews 
too  sacred  to  be  spoken  or  heard,  save  as  the  speaker  and  the  hearer  had 
been  purified  by  divine  wisdom.  It  was  pronounced  by  the  high  priest 
but  once  a  year,  on  the  day  of  atonement,  when  he  entered  the  holy  of 
holies.  What  was  its  true  pronunciation  is  a  matter  of  conjecture. 
This  sacredness  of  the  divine  name  is  a  symbol  of  the  meffable  sacred- 
ness  of  the  divine  personality,  before  whom  all  finite  personalities  bow  in 
silent  adoration.  So,  likewise,  there  is  in  every  child  of  God  a  person- 
ality too  sacred  to  be  approc-^ched,  save  as  Moses  approached  the  burning 


SERMONS.  349 

bush,  with  unsandaled  feet,  bowed  head,  and  reverent  attitude.  Person- 
ahty  is  a  holy  of  hoHes,  to  be  entered  only  by  the  divine  Spirit.  It  is  said 
that  the  Moslem  picks  up  every  bit  of  paper  blown  in  his  way  by  the 
wind,  to  see  if  the  name  of  Allah  be  written  thereon,  lest  he  should 
unwittingly  trample  on  the  sacred  name.  The  name  and  image  of  God 
are  impressed  on  every  spirit,  though  it  be  deformed  and  in  ruins,  and  it 
behooves  us  to  walk  carefully  and  reverently  in  the  presence  of  such. 
Spirit  spontaneously  respects  spirit,  admires  manifestations  that  awaken 
approbation,  venerates  wisdom  and  virtue,  reverences  noble  and  exalted 
character,  which  dispose  to  the  devotement  of  spirit  to  spirit  in  goodly 
offices  of  mutual  service.  The  dignity  and  majesty  of  infinite  power, 
wisdom,  and  goodness,  induce  to  devotion,  consecration,  in  the  unreserved 
surrender  of  will  and  life  in  filial  love,  becoming  thus  truepiety. 

Not  only  in  human  nature  but  in  all  nature  do  we  see  "a  presence 
divine,"  that  touches  the  spirit  with  reverent  admiration.  Linnaeus,  it  is 
said,  knelt  before  a  bank  of  golden  gorse  and  thanked  God  for  revealing, 
through  these  flowers,  so  much  of  his  own  beauty  to  him.  Wherever 
beauty  shines,  there  is  seen  the  sheen  of  the  divine  perfections;  wherever 
truth  lights,  there  is  seen  the  light  of  the  divine  wisdom ;  wherever  law 
marshals  order  out  of  chaos,  there  is  seen  the  glory  of  the  divine  will ; 
wherever  providence  comes  as  a  benediction,  there  is  seen  the  divine 
goodness,  and  call  for  reverent  thanksgiving. 

But  all  material  beauties,  grandeurs,  sublimities,  all  the  glories  of 
human  art,  sink  into  insignificance  before  the  majesty  of  spirit,  in  the 
presence  of  the  worthiness  of  its  worth,  in  the  claims  of  its  excellency,  in 
the  behests  of  its  dignity.  Rising  into  the  presence  of  the  absolute  and 
perfect  personality,  these  become  so  transcendent  and  ineffable  that  all 
finite  personalities  must  ever  adoringly  cry,  "  Holy,  holy,  holy,  Lord 
God  Almighty,  which  was,  and  is,  and  is  to  come." 

Young  friends,  to  you  who  are  about  to  go  forth  to  the  work  of  life, 

"The  hills  of  manhood  wear  a  noble  face, 
While  seen  from  far; 
The  mist  of  light,  from  which  they  take  their  grace. 
Hides  what  they  are. 

"The  dark  and  weary  path  those  cliffs  between 
Thou  canst  not  know, 
And  how  it  leads  to  regions  never  green. 
Dead  fields  of  snow." 

Yet  in  all  this  climbing, 

"Around  the  man  who  seeks  a  noble  end, 
Both  angels  and  Divinity  attend." 


350  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

Your  daily  spiritual  life  will  depend  upon  the  daily  spiritual  food,  the 
daily  spiritual  atmosphere,  and  the  daily  spiritual  light  shining  round 
about  you.  The  more  healthy,  invigorating,  luminous  these  are,  if 
properly  appropriated  and  used,  the  more  perfect  will  be  your  life  and 
growth.  From  the  realm  of  truth,  get  wisdom;  from  the  realm  of  beauty, 
get  ideal  grace  of  spirit;  from  the  realm  of  religion,  through  Christ,  get 
holiness.  Remember  that  all  getting  and  doing  are  but  means  for  growth 
in  perfectness.  In  proportion  to  the  steadfastness  of  purpose  with  which 
you  hold  to  this,  and  bear  up  against  all  inducement  and  danger,  beat 
down  all  opposing  and  hindering  obstacles  and  influences,  subjecting  all 
to  this  one  end,  using  all  temptations,  trials,  evils,  as  disciplmes,  all 
opportunity,  advantage,  privilege,  as  helps,  in  this  proportion  will  living 
and  doing  become  noble  and  worthy.  In  proportion  as  your  lives  become 
earnest  without  excitement,  zealous  without  passion,  calm  even  to  the 
sadness,  ever  characterizing  great  missioned  spirits,  in  the  light  of  a  high 
purpose,  will  they  bear  the  impress  of  dignity  and  sublimity.  In  propor- 
tion as  your  activities  go  out  in  self-abnegating  devotion  and  helpfulness 
to  others,  touching  their  lives  with  upward  impulses,  liberating,  sweeten- 
ing, upbuilding,  will  your  lives  be  beneficent  and  a  blessing.  In  propor- 
tion, as  in  all  these,  your  characters  are  patterned  after  the  great  Exemplar 
of  the  divine  character,  Christ  Jesus,  will  they  take  on  the  "beauty  of 
holiness." 


GHRISTOLOGY. 

A  correct  Christology  demands  that  the  person  of  Christ  shall 
embody: — 

1.  True  and  essential  deity. 

2.  True  and  essential  humanity. 

3.  These  two  natures  united  in  one  person. 

The  earlier  orthodoxy  also  demanded  that  there  should  be  no  mixture 
of  these  natures.  The  Council  of  Chalcedon,  in  its  endeavor  to  recon- 
cile the  opposed  schools  of  Alexandria  and  Antioch,  regarded  the  divine 
and  the  human  as  two  incommensurable  and  mutually  exclusive  entities. 
Regarding  them  as  different  in  kind,  it  held  that  there  could  be  no  unity 
or  union  save  in  juxtaposition. 

Accepting,  however,  the  doctrine  that  God  is  a  spirit  and  man  his 
child,  of  the  same  nature,  thus  akin  to  Deity,  related  in  essence,  God's 
own  ideal  image  of  himself,  the  archetype  after  which  the  human  was 
created,  was  actualized  in  the  divine-human,  the  God-man,  and  the  poten- 


SERMONS.  351 

tial  ideal  became  real  in  the  person  of  Christ.  He  was  the  human  tran- 
SLibstantiation  of  the  divine,  as  the  human  spirit  is  consubstantial  with 
God,  the  Father  of  spirits.  Luke  (3  :  38),  in  tracing  the  genealogy  of 
Christ,  makes  him  not  only  the  Son  of  God,  through  the  direct  agency 
of  the  Holy  Spirit,  but  through  Adam  also,  who  was  himself  the  "son  of 
God;"  so  that  Christ  in  his  twofold  nature  was  God  begotten.  Human- 
ity, in  its  original  and  pure  nature,  is  the  embodiment  of  the  divine 
nature,  as  Peter  declares,  "partakers  of  the  divine  nature."  The  Logos, 
the  Word,  was  the  type  of  humanity,  the  spiritual  Adam,  the  heavenly 
prototype.  Christ  is  the  archetype  of  man,  the  divine  ideal  of  humanity 
becoming  historic.  The  incarnation  was,  thus,  the  completion  of 
humanity. 

"Jesus  was  all  God  and  all  man" — the  type  of  all  true  and  perfect 
manhood.  He  was  not  a  man,  but  the  man — humanity.  Christ  was  not 
united  to  a  man,  but  became  man,  since  the  union  of  the  divine  and 
human  is  but  the  union  of  a  homogeneous. essence — one  and  the  same 
spiritual  essence,  which  is  both  divine  and  huinan.  Christ  is  the  God- 
man,  not  by  the  union  of  two  beings,  or  personalities,  in  the  same  person, 
but  the  one  being  or  person  is  both  divine  or  human,  Son  of  God  and  Son 
of  man.  He  is  not  two  natures  united,  yet  retaining  their  separate  iden- 
tity and  functions;  nor  yet  is  he  a  fusion  of  two  diverse  natures,  an  inter- 
mediate or  compound  nature.  The  divine  and  human  natures  being 
homogeneous  become  identical  in  a  person  who  is  both  divine  and 
human  in  all  his  attributes.  He  became  human  without  losing  the 
divine.  He  did  not  possess  a  divine  spirit  and  a  human  spirit  respec- 
tively distinct  in  consciousness,  thought,  sentiment,  and  volition,  but 
rather  two  natures  in  one  person,  not  by  union,  conjunction,  or  commin- 
gling, but  by  a  unity  in  identity,  for  wherever  there  is  personality  there 
is  identity.  God  and  man  are  one  in  Christ,  because  Christ  is  the  com- 
mon image  and  essence  of  the  divine  and  human.  As  Luther  says: 
"God  not  merely  has  flesh  or  humanity,  but  becomes  and  is  man.  With 
a  mutual  yearning,  each  becomes  the  other,  that  is,  Christ  appears  to 
humanity,  divine,  and  to  Deity,  human,  but  nothing  else  but  the  God — 
manhood."  Irenaeus  says,  "Christ  became  what  we  are  that  we  might 
become  what  he  is." 

Incarnation  wWioiit  a  Fall. — Christ  being  the  type  of  humanity  and 
the  source  of  its  spiritual  life  and  holiness,  is  it  an  incredible  or  an 
unscripturJil  doctrine  that  humanity  was  created  for  the  indwelling  of  the 
divine,  even  an  incarnation  without  the  fall  of  man?  The  universal  spon- 
taneity of  humanity  ever  reaches  after  an  incarnation,  as  the  necessary 


352  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

complement  and  consummation  of  itself.  Its  ideal  could  be  realized  in 
no  other  way.  The  human  was  doubtless  to  be  filled,  completed  by  an 
incarnation,  the  archetype  thus  passing  from  the  ideal  to  the  real,  irre- 
spective of  the  fall.  Christ  might  none  the  less  have  manifested  himself 
as  the  head  of  humanity.  The  incarnation  was  not  merely  an  arbitrary 
historical  event  dependent  upon  sin,  but  rather  an  ideal  one,  independent 
of  sin.  His  humanity  was  not  a  robe  to  be  put  on,  on  account  of  sin,  in 
which  to  suffer  for  humanity,  and  then  to  be  put  aside  in  the  glorified 
state,  but  rather  a  human  nature  assumed  forever,  and  glorified  as  an 
attribute  of  his  own  nature,  springing  from  the  prearranged  process  for 
the  outgoing  of  the  divine — not  as  a  result,  a  compensatory  development 
from  the  counterchecks  of  sin.  Was  it  the  incarnation  that  was  ushered 
in  by  sin?  Was  it  not  rather  the  suffering,  the  sacrifice  which  was  occa- 
sioned by  sin?  If  incarnation  was  by  occasion  of  sin,  can  we  not  sing, 
in  the  language  of  the  old  Latin  hymn,  "O  happy  crime,  the  merit  is  to 
thee  of  giving  us  the  redemption"? 

The  human  race,  in  its  sinless,  normal  condition,  demanded  a  head- 
ship. The  incarnation,  the  summit  point  of  connection  between  the 
divine  and  the  human,  gave  this  headship,  and  thereby  raised  the  race 
from  natural  development  to  spiritual  freedom  and  perfection.  The  high- 
est ideal  of  humanity  is  that  of  the  divine-human,  which  could  be  realized 
only  in  God's  counterpart,  the  archetypal  being  Christ.  The  divine  and 
the  human  are  forever  blended  in  the  Logos,  revealed  and  realized  in  the 
incarnation.  Thus  the  gulf  which  separates  the  Infinite  and  the  finite  is 
bridged — a  necessary  condition  for  the  indwelling  of  the  Spirit. 

Humanity  is  not  a  simple  granulated  mass,  like  a  heap  of  sand,  but 
an  organism,  the  members  of  whiqh  supplemented  each  other  in  a  living 
head — the  eternal  Logos.  It  is  admitted  generally  that  this  Logos  is  the 
spiritual  headship  of  the  race.  If  so  was  it  not  necessary  that  this  spir- 
itual headship  should  become  manifested  in  time,  become  historic,  thereby 
giving  a  bodily  unity  to  this  headship,  through  the  incarnation  whereby 
Christ  became  Immanuel? 


SERMO!,S.  353 


GOD,   THE  SUPREME   FATHER-MAN,    HIS  CHILD, 

All  sciences,  all  philosophies,  lead  up  to  theology.  As  is  one's  phi- 
losophy, so  will  be  his  theology.  This  is  abundantly  verified  in  the  two 
great  opposing  theories  respecting  the  knowledge  of  God,  which  we  have 
followed  down  the  ages. 

The  Aristotelian,  sensational,  experimental  school,  has  generally  either 
denied  to  the  mind  a  separate  faculty  of  reason,  or  failed  to  clearly  recog- 
nize its  functions,  deriving  all  knowledge  through  sense-perceptions;  hence 
the  mind  is  unable  to  transcend  the  notional,  under  the  limitations  of  the 
relative.  In  this  philosophy,  ideas  of  the  absolute,  the  infinite,  and  per- 
fect, have  no  place. 

The  Platonic,  intuitional,  idealistic  school  recognize  in  the  mind  a 
separate  faculty,  the  reason  giving  cognizance  of  the  absolute,  infinite, 
and  perfect,  and  all  necessary  universal  principles  and  truths.  Starting 
with  the  doctrine  that  the  personality  of  man  is  grounded  in  and  origi- 
nates from  the  personality  of  God,  this  personality,  manifesting  itself  as 
reason,  is  precedent  for  all  postulates  of  God  as  absolute,  infinite,  and 
perfect. 

This  doctrine  that  the  reason  is  the  organ  for  knowing  the  absolute  is 
grounded  in  the  more  fundamental  doctrine  that  man,  as  to  his  spiritual 
nature,  is  the  offspring  of  God.  By  the  divine  Fatherhood  is  meant  that 
he  is  the  originator  of  man  from  his  own  nature  and  in  his  own  likeness 
— in  Bible  language,  in  his  image  and  after  his  likeness,  and  the  continual 
living  in  and  by  his  life. 

The  Fatherhood  of  God  and  the  childship  of  man  is  a  doctrine  lying 
at  the  core  of  human  existence,  as  revealed  both  in  the  Bible  and  in  human 
consciousness,  determining  the  nature  of  that  existence,  and  its  ongoing 
in  the  individual,  in  the  race,  and  in  redemption. 

The  likeness  of  man  to  God  springs  from  this  kinship.  As  the  like- 
ness of  the  earthly  parent  is  reproduced  in  his  child,  not  so  much  in  form 
and  features  as  in  the  inner  and  more  essential  essence  and  nature,  of 
which  the  outward  is  but  a  faint  expression,  so  the  nature  and  image  of 
God  in  man  is  not  in  physical  conformation,  but  in  essence,  and  the  attri- 
butes of  this  essence.  As  like  can  beget  like  and  like  only,  whatever  is 
the  essential  nature  of  God,  the  Father,  such  must  be  the  essential  nature 
of  man,  the  child. 

This  doctrine  has  been  held,  in  all  times,  by  the  foremost  men  and  by 
the  foremost  peoples.  The  Vedas  pray,  "  May  the  Father  of  men  be 
favorable  to  us."     Homer  calls  him  "the  most  great  and  glorious  Father;" 

23 


354  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

Hesiod,  "the  Father  of  gods  and  men;'^  Horace,  "Father  and  Guardian 
of  the  human  race;"  Seneca,  "the  glorious  Parent  preparing  the  good 
man  for  himself ; "  the  Talmud,  "men,  children  of  their  Father,  who  is  in 
heaven;"  Plato,  "the  soul,  the  offspring  of  God." 

Jesus  based  his  mission  and  his  gospel  on  this  great  t»'uth.  Paul,  in 
declaring  the  "  unknown  God  "  of  the  Athenians  to  them,  predicated  the 
ground  of  this  knowledge,  in  the  declaration  of  certain  of  their  poets, 
"We  are  also  his  offspring." 

It  is  this  oneness  of  nature  that  gives  ability  for  intercommunion, 
whereby  God  can  reveal  himself  to  man,  and  whereby  man  can  apprehe\nd 
God,  and  receive  illumination,  inspiration,  and  life.  If  God  possesses  a 
nature  or  attributes  other  than  man's,  then  man  must  be  something  othef 
than  his  offspring,  and  man  cannot  know  him;  God  cannot  reveal  himself 
to  man.     There  can  be  no  intercommunication. 

What,  then,  is  this  common  nature  of  God  and  of  man,  his  child, 
whereby,  on  the  one  hand,  God  is  able  to  reveal  himself  to  man,  and,  on 
the  other,  man  is  enabled  to  apprehend  God?  Christ  enunciated  this 
essential  nature  when  he  declared,  "  God  is  Spirit,"  and  that  all  true 
knowledge  and  worship  must  spring  from  spirit  in  and  through  the  truth. 
Man,  as  a  partaker  of  the  divine  nature,  possesses  capacity  both  for  right 
worship  and  for  right  knowing  the  object  of  worship.  In  the  former  it  is 
.spirit  acting  as  faith-faculty;  in  the  latter  it  is  spirit  acting  as  reason- 
faculty. 

Reason  is  faculty  of  mind  as  spirit,  offspring  of  God,  giving  insight — 
"vision,"  Plato  calls  it — for  apprehending  its  supreme  Father,  perfect, 
infinite,  and  absolute,  with  all  necessary  and  universal  principles  and 
truths;  understanding  is  faculty  of  mind  as  soul,  embodied  spirit,  for 
giving  sense-perceptions,  notions,  judgments  of  relations,  likeness,  and 
difference. 

Man's  reason  thus  demands  an  Absolute  and  Infinite  God;  man's 
religious  nature  demands  a  living  God  as  supreme  Father.  Are  these 
demands  satisfied?  Does  man  know  God,  as  the  absolute  Being,  as 
infinite  Power,  as  living  Person,  as  supreme  Father? 

God,  as  being  absolute,  is  unconditionally  absolved  from  all  relations 
imposed  by  outward  conditions,  subject  only  to  relations  self-imposed 
and  springing  from  self-activity.  God,  as  Power  infinite,  is  unconditionally 
unlimited,  unrestricted  by  any  outward,  finite  powers,  subject  only  to 
self-imposed  restrictions,  in  the  limitations  of  a  finite  creation.  God,  as 
supreme  and  perfect  per.son,  is  independent  of  all  dependent  and  imper- 
fect personalities,  save  such  mutual  interdependencies  and  reciprocities  as 
are  graciously  granted. 


SERMONS.  355 

Man,  consciously  conditioned  as  relative,  finite,  dependent,  and 
imperfect,  intuitively  correlates  himself  to  God,  apprehended  as  the  abso- 
lute, infinite,  and  perfect  Person,  as  supreme  Father,  thus  freely  relating 
himself  to  his  children.  This  apprehension  lies  clear,  distinct,  and  posi- 
tive in  the  human  consciousness,  satisfying  at  once  the  spirit  as  expressed 
in  reason  and  faith.  The  properties  of  the  divine  nature,  consciously 
assured  by  faith,  intuitively  apprehended  by  the  reason,  are  yet  incom- 
prehensible, in  their  fullness  and  completeness,  by  the  understanding. 
Instead  of  this  intuitive  apprehension  of  God,  representing  contradictories 
or  counter  imbecilities  of  the  human  mind,  it  is  the  most  positive  and  con- 
sistent energy  of  which  the  mind  is  capable.  While  these  intuitive  affir- 
mations of  the  reason  cannot  be  expressed  in  the  limiting,  relative  terms 
of  the  understanding,  yet  man  never  thinks  so  positively,  vigorously,  and 
consistently  as  in  these  intuitive  apprehensions  of  God. 

God  is  thus  revealed  to  the  human  spirit,  through  reason,  absolute  in 
his  self-existence,  infinite  in  his  nature,  perfect  in  his  attributes,  supreme 
over  all  his  creatures. 


GO-WORKERS   WITH    GOD. 

"We  are  laborers  together  with  God."      i  Cor.  3:9. 
God,  the  absolute  Being,  the  infinite  Creator,  and  the  perfect  Person, 
reveals  in  all  his  works  power,  and  plan,  and  purpose. 

1.  Poiver. — God  is  essential  life,  power,  a  free,  self-originant  spon- 
taneity—omnipotent, omnipresent,  eternal — from  whose  fullness  and  sus- 
taining, informing,  and  organific  power  has  sprung  universal  nature,  in 
its  manifoldness  of  essence,  substance,  matter,  life,  worlds.  This  life- 
power  lives  in  all  existence,  extends  through  all  extent.  All  power, 
force,  movement  are  born  of  this  divine,  living  energy,  filling  all,  and 
living  in  and  through  all.  Man,  the  child  of  God,  the  supreme  Father, 
is  endowed  with  a  like  nature  of  everduring  life  energy,  a  like  self-originant 
cause,  capable  of  starting  new  streams  of  influences  and  effects.  Infinite 
life-power  is  the  primal  expression  of  all  divine  manifestations.  Finite 
life-power  is  the  primal  expression  of  all  human  manifestations. 

2.  Plan. — Life-energy,  whether  infinite  or  finite,  presupposes,  demands 
plan.  Without  it  the  product  of  power  is  chaos.  Deity  does  not  work 
blindly,  chaotically,  but  according  to  an  archetypal  plan.  His  ideals 
fashion  and  direct  his  power,  becoming  the  law  of  his  doing.  The  uni- 
verse is  their    objective  expression  and   realization.     In  this   realization 


356  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

the  physical  universe  must  develop  according  to  this  implanted  plan.  In 
their  growth,  the  oak  must  grow  oak;  pine,  pine;  maple,  maple;  apple, 
apple;  figs,  figs;  each  fi-uiting  fi'uit  after  its  kind.  Spirits,  in  their  high 
prerogative  of  free  will,  self-originant  cause,  are  lifted  from  the  realm  of 
necessity  to  that  of  freedom,  from  things  to  persons,  where  the  must  gives 
way  to  the  sway  of  the  ought.  Upon  them  is  imposed  the  behest  to  live, 
and  grow,  and  act,  and  bear  fruit,  according  to  the  divine  plan,  doing 
which  they  become  voluntary  co-workers  with  God. 

3.  Purpose. — The  very  idea  of  plan  implies  purpose,  or  an  end  in  view 
of  which  the  plan  is  a  forecast.  Otherwise  everything  planned  would 
become  a  play,  ending  in  the  thing  played.  Plans  demand  aims,  and 
aims  plans.  There  must  be  an  ultimate  aim  and  a  clear  prevision  and 
forecasting  in  respect  thereto,  in  all  wise  and  worthy  action. 

What  is  the  ultimate  aim  or  final  purpose  in  view  of  which  Deity 
works  both  in  creation  and  in  providence? — Evidently  the  highest  good 
of  universal  being.  This  highest  good,  in  the  ultimate  analysis,  is,  doubt- 
less, the  highest  perfection  of  such  being.  Deity,,  the  perfect  Person, 
seeks  to  realize  his  own  perfections  in  universal  finite  personalities.  This 
capability  of  growing  into  the  divine  perfections  constitutes  the  intrinsic 
excellency  of  finite  personality.  Simple  created  being,  though  a  good, 
cannot  be  the  highest  good.  This  is  attained  as  the  result  of  free  activity. 
Hence,  the  ultimate  aim  of  all  action  is  the  attaining  such  perfection, 
both  subjectively  and  objectively,  in  universal  being,  by  developing  and 
perfecting  intrinsic  excellency  according  to  the  highest  ideal  of  that 
being.  Seeking  such  perfection  becomes,  then,  the  highest  law  of  rea- 
son, the  highest  inspirations  of  love,  and  the  highest  behests  of  con- 
science. This  perfection  is  threefold;  of  the  reason,  in  wisdom;  of  the 
will,  in  righteousness;  of  the  sensibility,  in  blessedness — through  their 
harmonious  blending,  personal  perfection,  or  "the  beauty  of  holiness." 
The  powers  of  spirit  which  give  capability  of  perfection  in  this  threefold 
form,  constitute  its  threefold  excellency.  The  perfection  of  all  lower 
forms  of  existences  are  ministries,  helps,  inspirations,  for  the  perfection 
of  spirit  as  person. 

4.  Human  Agency. — The  highest  good  being  thus  attained,  and  all 
spiritual  behests  satisfied  in  seeking  the  perfection  of  universal  being,  and 
the  ultimate  end  of  creation  and  of  the  ongoings  of  providence  being  to 
this  same  end,  and  the  laws  springing  from  this  high  ideal  purpose  and 
guiding  to  its  consummation  being  the  behests  imposed  upon  humanity, 
this  same  end  should  be  the  aim  and  high  endeavor  of  every  human 
being.     As  Deity  seeks  to  suppress  all  evil  possible,  culture  all   good 


SERMONS.  ,  2>S7 

possible,  consistent  with  human  freedom,  and  subjecting  evil  to  good,  by 
restraining,  overruling,  guiding,  inspiring,  so  man,  his  co-worker,  should 
seek  to  develop  and  perfect  all  latent  possibilities,  assimilating  them  more 
and  more  to  the  divine  Original,  all  because  of  the  intrinsic  excellency  of 
these  divine  perfections.  This  divine  purpose  becomes  the  highest  law 
of  human  purposes,  activities,  and  progress.  Humanity,  in  its  on-flowing 
life,  should  be  the  unfolding  and  realization  of  the  divine  plans  and 
purposes. 

5.  The  Mode. — The  mode  of  working  for  the  ends  of  perfectness  is 
by  growth,  development.  Creation  started  from  chaos  and  is  leisurely 
advancing  on  the  lines  of  a  progressive,  growing  development  towards 
perfection.  Embodied  life  has  grown  in  complexness  of  structure  and 
diversity  of  function  and  manifoldness  of  action,  in  the  upward  scale  of 
being,  through  life  atomic,  li.Os  crystalline,  life  vegetal,  life  animal,  to  soul- 
life,  and  ultimately  to  its  highest  earthly  consummation,  spirit-life  in  man. 
He  is  its  microcosm,  capable  of  indefinite  progress,  thereby  giving  sig- 
nificancy  and  glory  to  the  whole. 

This  living  process  being  essentially  germinant,  growing,  multiplying, 
a  simple  segregation,  like  sand  particles  driven  together  by  waves  and 
trodden  down  by  storm's  heavy  foot;  the  exterior  compacting  of  hard 
particles,  rock-like;  the  on-flowing,  ever-increasing  volume  of  a  river,  a 
drop  from  which,  though  dropped  never  so  carefully  up  in  the  hill  coun- 
try, whence  rivers  spring,  cannot  gush  forth  a  perennial  fountain  and  run 
a  river;  nor  yet  an  edifice  framed  together  of  dead  parts  by  an  outside 
artificer,  and  when  completed  nothing  awaits  but  immobility  and  decay — 
none  of  these  are  fittest  emblems  of  this  living  growth.  Atom  and 
crystal  are  lifesome  and  prophetic  of  higher  life-forms.  The  germ,  the 
spore,  the  seed,  with  enfolded  germinal,  organic,  and  reproductive  life 
power,  will,  on  the  supply  of  proper  conditions,  spring  up,  fragile  at  first, 
subject  to  be  eaten  away  by  smallest  insect,  trodden  down  by  foot  of 
beast.  Give  time  and  genial  conditions  of  growth,  let  earth  and  air 
nourish,  let  dews  distill,  let  rains  descend,  let  sunlight  shine,  and  the  life- 
energy  takes  and  converts  all  into  growth.  Lichens  and  mosses  and 
ferns  spread  greenness  over  barren  rock  and  through  dismal  swamp,  till 
the  whole  smiles  in  the  new  dawn  of  beauty.  Grass  spreads  over  plains, 
climbs  the  hills,  descends  into  the  valleys,  and  rejoices  all  cattle.  The 
wheat  kernel  multiplies  and  supplies  bread  for  all  men.  The  acorn  sprouts 
and  grows  through  winds  and  storms,  first  a  thing  of  beauty,  then  of 
strength  and  grandeur,  multiplying  as  the  ages  tread  slowly  by,  becoming 
a  crown  of  slorv  to  all  hills,  a  strength  to  all  navies,  a  shelter  to  all  homes. 


358  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

a  warmth  to  all  firesides.  Not  only  vegetals,  but  animals,  men,  the  race, 
the  universe,  follow  the  same  law  of  progress  by  growth.  At  first  embry- 
onic, delicate,  fragile,  but  under  the  guidance  of  benignant  providences,  by 
slow  processes,  gathering  strength,  beauty,  manifoldness  of  function  and 
use. 

As  God  works  toward  the  ends  of  perfection  by  leisurely  develop- 
ments, so  must  man  work.  Every  soul  is  created  to  grow  into  the 
divine  ideal  and  fill  out  the  divine  purpose  by  growing  deeper,  broader, 
higher,  many-sided,  many-powered,  with  depth  of  thought,  largeness  of 
sympathy,  devotedness  of  purpose.  We  cannot  make  ourselves  what  we 
please,  but  we  can  grow  into  what  God  intends  us  to  be — beautiful  and 
full  of  divine  purpose.  Everyone  needs  thus  to  unfold  in  harmony  with 
himself  and  his  surroundings. 

Again,  in  this  growth  or  progressive  development,  descent,  outcome, 
fruitage,  is  a  universal  law.  The  inheritors  of  the  present  are  ever  enter- 
ing into  the  labors  of  the  past.  The  present,  in  becoming  the  past,  leaves 
a  legacy  of  achievement  and  influence  and  tendency  for  the  future,  to  be 
taken  and  appropriated  by  that  future,  as  it  becomes  the  present,  and  to 
be  augmented,  improved,  and  passed  on.  Each  age  and  each  individual 
of  that  age  enters  into  the  labors  of  all.  All  sow;  all  reap.  Each  sows 
for  all ;  each  reaps  for  all.  What  the  ages  have  been  makes  us  what  we 
are.  This  is  true  of  individuals,  communities,  organizations,  institutions, 
nations.  From  all  toil,  sacrifice,  suffering  for  human  weal,  there  spring, 
with  its  perpetual  growth,  principles  of  human  greatness,  human  progress 
and  civilization.  Out  of  the  ashes  of  the  dead  past  springs  the  living  pres- 
ent. Past  progress  becomes  the  source  of  greater  future  progress.  The 
lives  of  the  great  souls  of  all  ages  flow  into  all  receptive  souls  that  come 
after  thus  continuing  to  live  and  work  through  the  ages  in  ever-increas- 
ing efficiency.  Great  living  can  never  die.  Abraham  and  Moses  and 
John  and  Paul  and  Luther  and  Wickliffe,  all  great  workers  and  livers, 
though  great;  and  effective  in  their  ages,  are  greater,  more  effective,  more 
manifold  workers  in  this  age.  The  stream  of  their  influence  has  deep- 
ened, and  broadened,  and  clarified.  It  is  flowing  into  and  ennobling  all 
the  finer  and  more  perfect  types  of  progress  and  civilization. 

6.  Growth  Becoming  Institutional. — In  order  for  individual  growth,  and 
culture,  and  effort  to  become  civilization  or  race  culture  and  progress, 
they  must  be  embodied  in  organizations  and  institutions.  Individuals 
can,  by  thought,  and  word,  and  deed,  start  influences  and  tendencies  that 
shall  flow  onward;  but  in  order  to  render  these  enduring,  growing,  fruit- 
bearing,  they  must  be  embodied  in  systems,  organizations,  institutions. 


SERMONS.  359 

A  single  individual  is  as  a  plant  springing  up,  maturing,  and  dying  in  a 
single  summer.  Institutions  are  as  trees  growing  through  the  years  and 
the  ages,  gathering,  as  the  years  go  by,  strength,  beauty,  and  value. 
Man  is  the  dewdrop  disappearing  in  the  morning  sun;  institutions,  springs, 
flowing  perennially,  swelling  into  great  rivers,  becoming  perpetual  minis- 
tries to  man.  Institutions,  being  embodied  principles,  tendencies,  indus- 
tries, are  essential  to  human  progress  and  civilization. 

The  history  of  mankind  teaches  that  those  individuals  who  have 
lifted  humanity  to  higher  planes  of  civilization  have  been  those  who  not 
only  discovered  and  invented,  but  who  likewise  organized  their  discov- 
eries and  inventions  into  new  institutions,  thus  embodying  and  perpetuat- 
ing the  fruitage  of  progress,  to  become  the  seeds  of  higher  civilizations. 
As  the  result  of  these  manifold  forces,  modern  society  has  become 
wonderfully  complex  in  its  dependencies,  and  mutually  helpful  in  all  its 
operations.  As  Professor  Stanley  well  says,  while  the  word  "mankind" 
never  passed  the  lips  of  Socrates,  Plato,  or  Aristotle,  they  seeing  only 
individuals,  tribes,  barbarians,  and  hostile  nations,  we  see  mankind  many 
ways  severed,  but  bearing  one  image  of  God,  and  moving  to  one  destiny. 
As  in  the  heavenly  bodies,  where  the  ancient  astronomic  observer  saw 
only  separate  spheres  in  the  sky,  modern  astronomy  sees  a  single  system, 
balanced  in  itself  and  harmonized  by  one  centralizing  attraction. 

In  this  humanity,  thus  balanced  and  harmonized  by  one  centralizing 
attraction,  moving  to  a  common  destiny,  it  is  not  physical  power  that  is  to 
bear  sway  in  the  future  as  it  has  done  in  the  past,  but  mind,  free,  edu- 
cated mind,  controlling  and  directing,  not  only  the  elemental  forces  of 
nature  in  their  varied  applications,  but  mental  and  spiritual  forces  as  well. 
The  strongest,  the  best,  the  noblest  living  can  be  lived  only  in  and  through 
these  varied  and  complex  organic  human  relations,  wherein  it  is  the  glory 
of  heroic  and  sacrificial  soulsto  waive  personal  ends,  sacrifice  convenience, 
to  enrich  the  commonweal,  giving  the  high  communion  of  souls,  the 
lofty  converse  of  spirits  for  educating  and  perfecting  humanity. 

7.  Effective  Co-workers.— 1:0  become  effective  co-laborers  in  this 
divine  work  for  universal  perfectness,  one's  work  must  joint  into  the 
divine  plan,  and  move  on  with  the  divine  purpose,  as  expressed  in  the 
march  of  Providence  shaping  human  progress.  Such  an  one  must  tread 
to  the  rhythm  of  this  movement;  then  will  his  life  become  significant, 
and  crowned  with  true  and  permanent  success.  A  child  once  desired  to 
become  a  painter,  that  he  might  help  God  paint  the  sunset  skies.  It 
is  the  mission  of  all  to  help  reveal,  each  to  the  other,  the  divine  glory 
with  which  the  universe  is  aflame,  and  thus  become  co-artists  with  God. 


•76o  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

Moving  against  the  divine  purposes,  human  effort  is  as  water  spilled 
upon  the  ground ;  moving  with  that  "stream  of  tendency  by  which  all 
things  fulfill  the  law  of  their  being,"  that  is,  moving  with  the  powers  and 
purposes  of  God,  each  one  becomes  an  host;  against  them,  but  as  dust 
beneath  the  flaming  wheels  of  his  chariot.  As,  in  the  physical  world, 
bodies  moving  against  the  all-pervasive  law  of  gravitation  have  to  be 
toilsomely  lifted  as  dead  weights,  but  when  loosed  from  the  grapple  of 
the  lift,  how  noiselessly,  yet  with  ever-increasing  celerity,  they  rush  earth- 
ward! All  the  subtile  attractive  influences  of  gravity  stir  and  thrill  all 
their  minutest  atoms,  giving  them  ever-increasing  velocity  and  momen- 
tum. All  individuals,  organizations,  institutions,  moving  against  absolute 
laws,  are  dead  weights;  but  moving  with  them,  what  ever-accelerating 
energy  and  increasing  power  do  they  display!  Emerson  says,  "  Hitch 
your  wagon  to  a  star,  and  all  the  forces  of  the  universe  will  become  its 
steeds."  Lives  thus  hitched  to  those  great  principles  upon  which  human 
progress  depends,  will  find  themselves  moving  easily  and  grandly.  Such 
can  never  be  mere  flood-wood,  drifting  sluggishly  into  eddies  and  stag- 
nant pools,  or  rotting  among  the  effete  things  of  the  past,  nor  dead- 
heading at  the  expense  of  progress,  nor  wafted  along  by  popular  breezes, 
but  rather  riding  lifesomely  upon  the  crested,  combing  waves  of  human 
advancement,  sailing  on  the  advanced  tide,  well  ahead  of  the  world's 
great  flotilla.  Such  do  not  ride  in  an}-  worn-out  vehicle,  though  it  has 
run  a  hundred  years,  wanting  a  day  ;  but  rather,  Elijah-like,  go  up  into 
the  chariots  of  God,  as  they  flash  along  the  highways  of  Providence,  up 
the  steep  acclivities  of  progress,  far  above  the  graves  of  the  dead  past. 
Such,  though  reviled  and  persecuted  in  their  own  age,  have  gone  up  to 
the  world's  spiritual  thrones. 

8.  Specialties.— Effective  labor,  as  related  to  humanity,  is  indicated 
through  the  common  human  spontaneities.  To  every  youth  comes  the 
absorbing  and  not  infrequently  greatly  perplexing  question,  My  life- 
work,  what  shall  it  be  ?  That  sphere  is  too  contracted,  this  too  one- 
sided. One  calling  is  too  frivolous,  another  too  groveling,  another  of 
doubtful  utility,  or  with  bad  tendencies.  Perchance,  the  means  are  insuf- 
ficient to  the  ends,  the  foundation  too  feeble  for  the  superstructure.  Give 
a  work  congenial,  adapted,  noble,  satisfying,  and  joyfully  will  he  work. 
To  everyone  honestly  and  earnestly  seeking  to  know  his  particular  and 
definite  life-work,  there  come  such  longings,  questionings,  prospectings. 
Without  a  place  and  a  work  one  is  pitiable  indeed.  Discontented,  vascil- 
lating,  nerveless,  or  spasmodic  in  effort,  till  some  definite  and  assured 
call  lifts  him  to  his  feet,  then  he  becomes  purposeful,  energetic,  therefore 


SERMONS.  361 

successful  and  happy.  Henceforth  he  has  a  standing  place,  self-support, 
self-respect,  soul-growth,  social  value,  public  service. 

Thus,  the  choice  of  the  particular  line  of  this  labor  becomes  one  of 
the  most  difficult  yet  imperative  decisions  of  life.  Important  interests 
and  consequences  cluster  around  such  decisions,  not  only  physical,  but 
spiritual,  not  only  to  the  individual,  but  to  society.  This  choice  must 
be  made,  too,  in  youth,  with  its  inexperience  assisted,  it  may  be,  by  the 
counsel  and  caution  of  friends;  yet,  with  all  aids  possible,  the  choice  may 
be  but  as  the  uncertain  casting  of  lots  respecting  unforeseen  events. 
Life  is  too  short  and  powers  too  feeble  to  warrant  leisurely  and  object- 
lessly  ranging  among  many  or  diverse  pursuits.  Seldom,  likewise,  does 
a  person  possess  that  many-sided  faculty  and  tact  which  will  enable  him 
to  become  an  adept  in  diverse  pursuits,  and  a  successful  driver  of  several 
trades  harnessed  either  tandem  or  abreast.  This  tendency  is  the  prolific 
source  of  quacks  and  quackery.  One  calling  well  filled,  girdled  by  those 
labors  imposed  upon  all  by  common  human  interests,  is  generally  all- 
sufficient. 

9.  Aptitude. — One's  special  mission  is  to  be  ascertained,  not  by  spin- 
ning it  spider-like  out  of  the  brain,  but  by  searching  diligently  for  the 
divine  call,  not  only  in  the  still,  small-voiced  sense  of  duty,  but  as  expressed 
in  bent,  taste,  aptitude,  as  well.  Adaptability,  liking,  are  considerations 
of  prime  importance  in  determining  one's  calling.  As  in  physical  nature. 
Deity,  with  a  few  simple  elements,  has  wrought  the  world's  wondrous 
variety  of  utility  and  of  beauty,  so  with  an  underlying  uniformity  and 
lilceness  in  humanity  newness  and  variety  are  revealed  in  the  peculiarities 
and  tendencies  of  each  individual.  One,  sun-like,  illumes  and  vivifies; 
another,  tempest-like,  sweeps  and  thunders  over  the  earth;  others,  dew- 
like, distill  refreshing  influences.  A  few  stand,  palm-like, "solitary  and 
grand,  shedding  beauty  over  vast  wastes;  other  few,  graceful  elms,  sing- 
ing pines,  majestic  oaks,  grow  grand  by  heat  and  cold  and  storm;  others, 
still,  with  the  litheness  of  the  willow,  sensitiveness  of  the  poplar,  meek- 
ness of  the  violet,  delicate  loveliness  of  the  anemone,  the  ethereal  sweet- 
ness of  the  eglantine,  or  clinging  vine-like.  As  each  several  plant  diver- 
sity has  its  office  in  the  economy  of  nature,  so  each  several  individual 
diversity  has  its  office  in  human  progress  and  civilization. 

Callings  have  a  like  diversity.  Possessing  generic  unity,  they  diverge 
into  species  and  varieties,  with  individual  peculiarities,  so  that  each  may 
find  among  the  group  of  allied  pursuits  to  which  his  bent  tends  some 
one  adapted  to  him.  One  finding  thus  his  work  can  work  it  better  than 
any  other. 


362      •  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

Every  calling  promotive  of  the  general  weal  is  both  useful  and  hon- 
orable; yet,  in  respect  to  intrinsic  nobleness,  they  differ  as  stars  differ  in 
glory.  Those  pursuits  which,  while  keeping  in  check  the  lower  forces, 
develop  and  nurture  those  higher  powers  that  make  to  the  elevation  of 
humanity,  have  the  greater  dignity.  They  are  to  be  coveted  as  the  better 
gifts,  provided  aptitude  and  capability  warrant.  Many  a  lowly  station  has 
been  deprived  of  a  good  occupant  to  furnish  a  poor  one  for  a  higher. 
Better  be  asked  to  come  up  than  to  go  down.  The  lowliness  of  the  lot 
matters  less  than  the  spirit  with  which  it  is  filled  and  the  virtues  nur- 
tured by  thus  living.  To  conform  ourselves  gracefully  and  cheerfully 
to  the  sphere  in  which  Providence  has  placed  us,  and  give  ourselves 
earnestly  to  its  work,  doing  faithfully  and  well  the  present  duty,  however 
humble,  is  both  useful  and  noble,  and  this  may  open  to  other  and,  per- 
haps, better  spheres.  If  we  do  thus  the  one  thing  which  the  passionate 
energy  of  our  whole  being  calls  us  to  do,  and  do  it  in  harmony  with 
the  organic  laws  and  guiding  tendencies  of  the  universe,  we  work  rightly. 
This  is  true  living. 

10.  Preparatory  Culture  of  Aptitudes. — In  order  that  success  may 
crown  effort,  the  knowledge  of  one's  calling  must  be  both  accurate  and 
extended,  both  theoretical  and  practical.  While  one  should  knozv  some- 
thing about  many  things,  he  should  knozv  everything  possible  about  one 
things  his  work.  All  kindred  pursuits  and  knowledge,  indeed,  all  culture, 
may  be  laid  under  contribution.  The  basis  of  all  wise  activity  is  a  knowl- 
edge that  enables  one  to  know  himself,  the  world,  and  the  God  of  both, 
and  that  enables  one  to  use  himself  and  the  world,  according  to  the 
divine  plan  implanted  therein.  To  this  end  he  must  first  have  that 
knowledge  which  lies  in  the  line  of  his  aptitudes.  If  his  aptitudes  lead 
him  to  work  with  and  upon  men,  the  knowledge  of  man,  historically, 
through  all  avenues  of  civilization,  is  an  imsurpassed  source  of  light 
and  stimulus.  The  historic  study  of  the  capabilities  and  performances 
of  the  human  spirit  are  lessons  of  capital  importance.  When  such  knowl- 
edge is  assimilated  in  mental  growth,  it  becomes  vital  and  formative.  It 
feeds,  vitalizes,  and  strengthens  one's  own  activity.  The  knowledge  of 
the  world  is  likewise  vital  and  invigorating,  especially  to  those  working 
with  and  upon  its  forces.  Religion  gives  the  vital  knowledge  of  God. 
Everyone  is  born  with  aptitudes  for  receiving  vital  knowledge  through 
one  or  more  of  these  sources,  by  studying  man,  nature,  God.  The  great 
and  complete  spirits  who  have  equal  aptitudes  for  all  are  rare.  It  is  the 
business,  in  education,  to  discover  and  develop  these  aptitudes.  All 
means  of  knowledge  are  correlated,  and   have  equal  worth  and  dignity 


SERMONS.  •  363 

in  their  appropriate  spheres,  and  should  be  united,  but  held  in  subjection 
to  aptitudes.  In  proportion  as  a  human  spirit  sweeps  this  broad  circle, 
in  that  same  proportion  will  it  have  life  and  growth  and  vigor,  and  be 
manifoldly  enriched  in  all  directions.  No  part  of  this  circle  is  common 
or  unclean,  yet  its  sweep  is  so  vast,  and  human  faculties  so  limited,  that 
it  can  be  comprehended  and  becQme  formative  only  in  its  general  and 
fundamental  principles;  and  the  chief  attention  must  be  given  to  a  single 
aptitude,  or  group  of  aptitudes,  in  order  for  an  individual  to  get  the  best 
culture  for  use.  To  get  the  best  for  each,  the  aptitudes  of  each  must  be 
found  and  nurtured,  while  broadened,  enriched,  and  strengthened  through 
the  awakening  and  strengthening  of  the  non-aptitudes.  The  aptitudes 
of  each  individual  point,  like  the  magnetic  needle  to  the  pole,  to  some 
kind  of  knowledge.  Let  this  polarity  be  found,  strengthened,  and  used. 
In  this  way,  and  this  only,  can  each  become  the  most  efficient  co-worker 
with  God,  the  author  and  designer  of  these  aptitudes,  and  implanted  in 
each  expressly  as  being  the  best  agency  possible  in  carr3nng  out  the 
divine  purposes.  All  are  most  easily  vitalized  and  enthused  by  those 
studies  lying  in  the  line  of  these  divinely  implanted  aptitudes.  As  the 
correlation  and  transmutation  of  force  give  chemical  affinity,  heat,  light, 
magnetism,  electricity,  all  from  the  same  fluent  force,  operating  in  mani- 
fold and  diverse  phenomena,  so  in  spiritual  life  its  phenomena  appear 
either  as  head  power,  the  light  of  truth,  rejoicing  in  the  philosophies;  or 
as  heart  power,  the  heat  of  feeling,  emotion,  blessed  in  superabounding 
love;  or  as  hand  power,  jubilant  in  works,  in  all  utilities.  The  object  of 
education  is  to  aid  nature  in  perfecting  and  expressing  these  individ- 
ualisms,  not  to  destroy  them.  The  office  of  culture  is  to  cooperate  with 
Deity  in  perfecting  a  manifoldly  endowed  humanity  in  its  richest  diver- 
sity. Neither  culture  nor  labor  should  produce  what  is  scientifically 
known  as  arrested  development,  by  dwarfing  the  aptitudes,  in  educating 
and  working  away  from  them.  These  should  be  strengthened  and  the 
non-aptitudes  brought  into  harmonious  but  subordinate  relations. 


•  64  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 


IDEAL  YOUTHFUL  GROWING. 

[Baccalaureate  sermon   before   the  graduating  class  of  Alfred  University,  June  26, 
1890.] 
"And  Jesus  increased  in  wisdom  and  stature,  and  in  favor  with  God 
and  man."      Luke  2:52. 

"And  the  child  Samuel  grew  on,  and  was  in  favor  both  with  the  Lord, 
and  also  with  men."      i  Sam.  2:26. 

Generally  it  is  the  wish  and  aim  of  parents  to  have  their  children  rise 
higher  in  the  scale  of  life  than  has  been  attained  by  themselves.  They 
seek  to  have  them  more  achieving  and  successful  on  whatever  line  they 
themselves  have  considered  most  desirable  and  have  sought  to  excel. 
This  may  be,  perchance,  to  become  richer,  more  influential,  more  famous, 
better  cultured,  more  devout  and  consecrated,  every  way  better  and 
nobler.  Even  the  exceptions  prove  the  rule,  for  the  bad  seldom  desire 
their  children  to  be  bad.  The  pessimist,  the  doubter,  the  shiftless,  the 
sluggard,  the  drunkard — all  manner  of  evil  thinkers  and  evil  doers — 
seldom  desire  to  have  themselves  reproduced  and  perpetuated  in  their 
children,  but  prefer,  rather,  to  have  them  become  optimists,  finding  good 
instead  of  evil,  sustained  by  the  light  and  warmth  of  faith  instead  of 
benumbed  by  the  fog  and  chill  of  doubt,  filled  with  enthusiasm  instead 
of  indifference,  good  thoughts,  feelings,  and  purposes  instead  of  evil 
ones,  pluck  and  enterprise  instead  of  sluggishness  and  indolence.  Thus 
parents  largely  desire  and  hope  to  see  their  better  selves,  or  better  than 
themselves,  perpetuated  in  their  descendants. 

To  this  end  most  parents  are  willing  to  live  and  work  and  sacrifice 
for  their  children's  good.  The  more  unselfish  they  are,  and  the  higher 
their  ideal,  the  greater  will  be  their  willingness  to  sacrifice.  Thus  it 
comes  to  pass  that  children,  not  from  their  own  impulsion,  but  that  of 
their  parents,  are  started  on  an  upward  way.  At  great  expense  and  sac- 
rifice the  nurture  and  culture  of  home,  church,  and  school  are  provided. 
In  all  this  the  child  is  at  first  a  comparatively  passive  recipient.  The 
primary  longing  and  aspiration  that  impel  spring  not  from  within  but 
from  without. 

A  time  of  awakening  comes,  however,  late  or  soon  in  the  life  of  every 
thoughtful  and  earnest  young  mind.  In  this  awakening  new  desires  and 
aspirations  arise  for  something  better.  As  the  spring  sun  stirs  plant  life 
into  new  activity  and  growth,  so  the  light  of  this  something  better  begets 
effort  and  growth.  Such  become  enthused  with  an  impulse  for  self- 
development.     They  depend  no  longer  upon  outward  propelling  forces, 


SERMONS.  365 

but  are  impelled  by  inherent  energies,  leading  to  the  voluntary  and 
earnest  seeking  to  become  continually  more  and  more  perfected  in  all 
that  goes  to  the  making  of  a  noble  personality.  Such  realize  a  new 
dignity  in  living  that  intensifies  and  multiplies  the  powers  and  activities 
of  all  their  faculties.  They  glow  with  a  flame  that  ever  rises  brighter 
and  higher.  Everything  true,  beautiful,  and  good  awakens  admiration, 
investigation,  thought,  thereby  producing  growth  culture. 

To  the  end  of  growing  in  perfectness  is  life  given.  The  divine  life- 
energy  descending  upon  the  world  gives  life  in  an  ascending  series  up  to 
life  spiritual.  In  common  with  the  plant,  man  possesses  bodily  life;  in 
common  with  the  animal,  he  possesses  soulish  or  animal  life;  in  common 
with  God,  he  possesses  spiritual  life.  Each  of  these  ascending  grades 
has  its  own  type,  forces,  laws,  and  environments,  in  view  of  which  it  was 
created,  and  in  harmony  with  which  it  acts  and  grows  and  is  sustained. 
Each  of  the  higher,  while  coalescing  with  these  below,  yet  superinduces 
upon  them  its  own  higher  principles  and  laws,  to  which  they  become 
subject  and  act  as  servants. 

Again,  as  man's  physical  nature  is  environed  by  the  physical  world, 
and  draws  its  support  and  growth  therefrom;  as  his  mental  nature  is 
environed  in  truth  and  law,  and  gets  light,  strength,  and  growth  there- 
from, so  his  spiritual  nature  is  environed  in  God,  in  whom  he  lives,  moves, 
and  acts.  Thus  man,  whose  being  is  in  God,  finds  himself  in  the  world, 
living  and  growing  and  acting  amid  earthly  environments. 

The  young  in  the  human,  as  in  all  other  forms  of  life,  instinctively 
seek  to  get  into  harmony  with  these  varying  environments,  and  thus 
secure  health  and  activity,  whereby  they  grow  spontaneously  and  nat- 
urally, as  grow  the  lilies  of  the  valley,  the  pines  of  the  hills.  This  tends 
to  wholeness  or  completeness  of  the  entire  being.  Thus  young  Samuel 
"grew  on,  and  was  in  favor  both  with  the  Lord,  and  also  with  men." 
Thus  the  youthful  Jesus  "increased  in  wisdom  and  stature,  and  favor 
with  God  and  man." 

That  the  young  thus  grow  it  is  essential  that  they  conform  to  the 
laws  leading  to  completeness  of  being,  the  end  to  be  sought  in  the  culti- 
vation of  each  and  every  department  and  power.  This  completeness 
requires  the  proportional  subordination  of  the  lower  attributes  and  fac- 
ulties to  the  higher  in  the  degree  of  their  respective  importance.  The 
physical  must  be  subordinated  to  the  mental,  and  both  to  the  spiritual. 
Otherwise,  the  animal  may,  as  it  not  infrequently  does,  overshadow  and 
submerge  both  of  the  higher,  or  the  intellect  ruin  both  body  and  soul. 
Seek  a  sound,  strong,  vigorous  body,  for  a  sound,  strong,  vigorous  mind, 


366  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

to  the  end  that  both  may  be  apt,  supple,  and  helpful  servants  to  the 
behests  of  spiritual  excellency,  doing  readily  and  efficiently  its  biddings. 
Completeness,  likewise,  demands  an  even  and  harmonious  balance  of 
all  coordinate  powers  and  susceptibilities,  preventing  thereby  all  one- 
sidedness  and  distortion,  and  promoting  an  all-sided  growth,  as  of  a  tree 
growing  in  wide  open  spaces,  with  air  and  sun  and  storm  beating  in 
upon  all  sides.  To  this  end  each  power  and  susceptibility  requires  to 
be  so  incited,  guided,  and  restrained  in  that  proportion,  symmetry,  and 
harmony  as  shall  tend  to  the  highest  perfection  of  all. 

Open,  receptiv-e,  passive  natures,  without  power  of  self-assertion  or 
resistance,  are  colored  and  imbued,  overcome  and  absorbed,  by  strong 
influences  and  decided  characters,  instead  of  being  properly  developed 
by  them.  Such  need  to  cultivate  indivaduality,  self-assertion,  self-control, 
self-guidance.  Those  having  special  aptitudes  have  therein  special  weak- 
nesses also.  The  aptitude  for  business  begets,  if  unchecked,  an  absorbing 
love  of  gain  to  the  ignoring  of  all  the  higher  claims  of  the  spirit.  The 
scientific  proclivities  tend,  Samson-like,  to  grind  blindly  at  the  Philistine 
mill  of  matter  and  phenomena,  ignoring  the  spiritual  light  that  shine.9 
above  and  around.  The  aesthetic  tendency  inclines  to  turn  self-indulgently 
from  the  rugged  paths  of  duty  and  self-denial,  and  voluptuously  bask  in 
the  limpid  light  of  literature  and  art.  The  fine  and  great  spirits,  with 
intuitive  vision,  clear,  serene,  far-reaching,  and  strong,  are  not  prone  to 
become  enthralled  by  these  lower  forces  of  special  bents,  as  are  second- 
rate  ones. 

In  order  to  check  and  overcome  this  tendency  of  a  bias  to  result  in 
an  abnormal  and  deformed  development,  it  is  essential  to  live  and  work 
in  the  light  of  liigh  ideals.  The  ideal  forming  power  is  at  once  one  of 
the  most  mysterious  and  the  most  distinctive  endowment  of  man,  yet  it 
does  not  necessarily  subserve  high  ends.  It  is  the  faculty  by  which  man 
is  led  to  sink  himself  below  the  brute,  or  to  climb  perpetually  to  higher 
planes  of  being.  There  is  ever  the  sense  of  incompleteness  and  the  con- 
sciousness of  higher  possibilities  and  of  more  exalted  attainments  hov- 
ering over  the  earnest  one.  "Well  done"  has  ever  the  refrain,  "Not  well 
enough  done."  There  is  always  a  better  just  beyond  the  realized  good. 
It  is  after  these  unattained  ideals  that  the  world's  unrest  strives.  Striving 
for  these  gives  growth,  progress.  This  is  the  leading,  impelling  force  in 
the  elevation  of  humanity.  It  quickens  and  intensifies  the  influence  of 
the  world's  masterful  minds.  The  perception  by  them  of  what  might  be 
is  the  prophecy  and  promise  of  what  will  be.  The  desire  to  transform  a 
defective  attainment  into  a  better  is  the  inspiration    impelling   all    true 


SERMONS.  367 

reformers  and  reforms.  Unsatisfied  with  what  now  is  and  witli  a  fore- 
sight of  the  possible,  they  put  their  hands  to  the  work  of  actuahzing  this 
ideal,  thus  securing  the  achievements  of  the  race  and  the  advancement 
of  civilization.  Without  the  unrest  and  ferment  produced  by  this  power, 
man  would  be  unprogressive.  It  bears  the  ensign  of  progress  before  all 
generations  of  men.  Both  the  proof  and  the  measure  of  the  divinity  of 
aim,  alike  for  the  individual  and  for  humanity,  is  in  this  character  of  the 
impelling  and  guiding  ideals. 

Mere  industry,  integrity,  and  honesty  of  purpose  are  not  enough. 
Ideals  must  be  sought  after  which  to  pattern,  and  thus  convert  their 
inner  and  higher  spirit  and  power  into  life  and  action.  The  earnest 
seeker  after  the  high  and  noble  will  avail  himself  of  all  the  helps  possible 
in  the  perfecting  of  his  ideal  and  of  himself.  Great  personalities  present 
patterns  which  the  young  spontaneously  adopt  as  models.  If  such  a 
personality  is  genuinely  noblest  and  best,  it  is  reverenced,  loved,  and 
there  is  thenceforth  ever  present  to  the  mind's  eye  a  reality  and  a  rule, 
strong  to  restrain,  to  mould,  and  to  direct.  The  coming  of  a  doctrine, 
the  stress  of  a  dogmatism,  of  a  creed,  are,  in  comparison,  as  chaff 

Such  ideals  are  the  inspirers  of  hope,  heroic  attempt,  and  tireless 
effort,  ever  importuning  to  increased  exertion  along  the  line  of  limitless 
activity.  But  as  the  pattern  is  approached,  imperfections  are  discovered, 
and  others  are  sought.  It  is  only  in  the  sad  life  without  laughter,  lived 
nearly  two  thousand  years  ago,  growing  in  favor  with  God  and  man  as 
the  years  went  by,  that  the  ideal  is  found  which  fills  with  reverence  and 
softens  with  tenderness  and  becomes  a  perpetual  imperative,  "Be  ye 
perfect  as  your  Father  in  heaven  is  perfect."  His  alone  is  the  adequate 
and  unfailing  model. 

In  seeking  such  an  ideal  doing  becomes  habit.  Habit  grows  into  a 
second  nature,  called  character.  Character  is  that  nature  which  each 
one  builds  up  for  himself  out  of  the  activities  of  life  from  his  environ- 
ments and  opportunities.  This  character  is  moulded  more  and  more 
into  the  likeness  and  image  of  the  ideal.  This  is  finely  illustrated  in  the 
legend  of  the  "  Great  Stone  Face,"  chiseled  by  nature  in  lofty,  calm,  and 
benignant  aspect  upon  the  mountain's  brow.  A  deliverer,  so  the  legend 
ran,  was  to  arise  who  was  to  bear  the  lineaments  and  possess  the  char- 
acter thus  expressed.  A  boy  of  the  valley  made  a  constant  and  reverent 
study  of  that  face.  As  the  years  went  by  he  became  gradually  and 
insensibly  moulded  into  its  likeness  and  character,  till  at  length  the 
people  perceived  the  resemblance,  and  also  found  in  him  the  promised 
deliverer. 


368  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

Great  and  rare  characters  are  formed  through  life  experiences,  their 
individuahty  strengthened  and  ennobled  in  the  light  of  great  ideals,  to 
become,  in  turn,  invigorating  and  elevating  influences  to  others.     They 
touch  the  quick  and  suggest  possibilities  undreamed  of  before. 
"The  heights  by  great  men  reached  and  kept 
Were  not  attained  by  sudden  flight, 
But  they,  while  their  companions  slept, 
Were  toihng  upward  in  the  night." 

The  essential  prerequisite  for  such  getting  of  character  is  hungering 
and  thirsting  for  those  things  that  satisfy  the  higher  nature.  The  nutri- 
ment that  feeds  this  nature  must  be  sought,  taken  up,  and  assimilated 
into  life,  thereby  broadening,  deepening,  and  enriching  it.  Fact  must  be 
converted  into  faculty,  insight  into  wisdom,  thought  clothed  with  the 
thews  of  power,  illumination  transformed  into  life.  Personal  power  thus 
invigorated  and  guided  to  the  ends  of  perfection  is  continually  augmented 
by  all  right  activities.  With  mind  clear,  heart  clean,  will  strong,  the 
whole  being  fed  from  the  fountain  of  life,  the  entire  scope  and  impetus 
to  developing  character  is  enlarged.  Its  sinewy  vigor  becomes  a  virile 
spiritual  power,  forming  and  reforming,  refining,  elevating  through 
tenacity  and  persistency  of  effort,  with  definiteness  and  steadfastness  of 
aim,  unwearied  by  toil,  undiscouraged  by  obstacles,  dwelling  in 
"  Regions  mild,  of  calm,  serene  air, 
Above  the  smoke  and  stir  of  this  dim  spot 
Which  men  call  earth." 
This  growth  should  not  be  exogenous,  by  outside  layers  and  accre- 
tions, but  endogenous,  by  inside  development,  working  from  the  center 
of  being  outward  by  a  living  energy  and  process,  affecting,  moulding, 
refining,  and  ennobling  the  whole  being,  making  pliable  and  supple  all 
the  faculties.  It  begets  grace  in  attitude,  a  right  noble  bearing  and 
movement,  a  calm,  open,  frank  brow,  clear,  steady,  honest,  trustful  eye, 
gentleness  and  mellowness  of  voice,  refining  away  all  harshness  and  loud- 
ness without  meaning,  giving  instead  subdued  strength  and  richness, 
with  attracting  and  captivating  power  through  the  kindly  and  gracious 
sentiments  revealed.  It  begets  a  right  manly  dignity  that  shines  out 
from  the  entire  personality.  This  results,  not  from  outside  attrition  and 
polish  and  formality,  but  from  an  inward  impulse. 

This  growth  requires  time.  A  manufactured  article  can  be  turned 
out  complete  in  all  its  parts  at  the  start,  but  everything  the  result  of 
growth  demands  time  for  its  perfection,  and  the  greater,  the  more  durable 
and  valuable  the  resultant,  the  longer  the  time  required.  This  is  a  law 
of  the  spiritual  as  well  as  of  the  physical  world. 


SERMONS.  369 

But  above  all  of  these,  and  more  important,  is  the  divine  side  of 
human  relations,  and  the  results  springing  therefrom.  The  continually 
indwelling  presence  and  life  of  God,  ever  renewing  a  divine-human  life, 
is  as  necessary  for  spiritual  life  and  health  and  growth  as  light,  air,  and 
food  for  bodily  well  being.  This  enables  one  to  live  and  to  act  spir- 
itually. It  is  in  vain  to  aspire  to  be  self-sufficient,  to  stand,  walk,  and 
act  alone.  We  truly  live  only  when  the  indwelling  life  and  power  of 
God  awaken  all  the  spiritual  faculties  into  tuneful  activity. 

Faith,  as  open  and  clear  vision,  or  God-consciousness,  seeing  and 
experiencing  him  as  "all  and  in  all,"  with  undoubting  assurance,  enables 
man  to  apprehend  him  as  the  beginning  of  all  beginning,  the  life  of  all 
life,  the  will  of  all  will,  the  thought  of  all  thought,  the  love  of  all  love, 
the  conscience  of  all  conscience,  nearer  and  more  to  each  soul  than  that 
soul  is  to  itself  All  spiritual  life  being  directly  from  God,  it  must  be 
perpetually  supplied  from  its  source.  The  faith  faculty  is  organ,  and 
faith  the  prerequisite  condition  for  the  inflow  of  this  divine  life. 

This  faith  assurance  awakens  reverence  for  God,  as  the  supreme 
excellency,  reverence  for  spiritual  self-excellency,  and  for  all  other  spir- 
itual excellencies,  reverent  obedience  to  divine  authority  and  law,  reverent 
service  to  others  as  his  children,  allegiance  to  all  that  is  noblest  and  best. 
To  thus  reverence,  obey,  and  serve  are  the  "altar  stairs"  that  lead  upward 
to  God. 

Faith,  as  trust  and  self-surrender,  stands  with  open,  empty  hands 
and  heart  in  ready  and  prayerful  receptivity  for  the  divine  life  and  light, 
as  flowers  stand  with  open  petals  to  receive  the  inflowing  sunlight  and 
convert  it  into  growth.  "  Thy  will  be  done  on  earth  as  it  is  in  heaven," 
is  both  a  prayer  and  a  disposition,  the  very  source  of  all  true  and  right 
living  and  doing.  When  self  ends  give  way  and  are  absorbed  in  divine 
ends,  then,  and  only  then,  will  life  take  on  its  large  and  high  significance. 
The  one  essential  of  true  life  and  growth  is  not  to  devise  and  plan  for 
self,  but  to  accept  the  divine  purpose  and  plan,  and  to  work  with  them 
and  with  the  forces  that  are  moving  the  world,  to  accept  and  do  the 
present  duty  as  presented  by  present  opportunity.  The  allotted  process 
of  growth  demands  that  one,  like  clay  in  the  hands  of  the  divine  Potter, 
become  responsive  to  every  touch  of  the  divine  hand,  welcoming  the 
pressure,  even  when  felt  in  pain,  having  faith  in  the  divine  ends  in  view. 
It  is  the  high  privilege  as  well  as  duty  to  live  and  act  under  the  guidance 
of  God.  A  life  thus  led  on,  under  the  nurture  and  guidance  of  God,  will 
become  a  complete  and  beautiful  whole.  This  assurance  gives  support 
amid  trials,  inspiration  to  endeavor,  dignity  to  life's  lowliest  conditions. 


24 


370  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

When,  in  the  late  war,  a  clergyman  said  to  President  Lincoln,  "We 
will  pray  that  the  Lord  will  be  on  our  side,"  he  replied,  "  No,  no;  rather 
pray  that  we  may  be  on  the  Lord's  side."  This  embodies  the  entire  and 
highest  principles  of  both  praying  and  doing,  indeed,  the  whole  philosophy 
of  living.  Thus  will  life  be  truly,  nobly,  beautifully,  divinely  lived.  Then 
will  spring  up  steadfastness  of  soul  in  clinging,  in  the  trustfulness  of  faith, 
in  spite  of  difficulties  and  darkness,  to  the  assurance  that  God  leads, 
giving  resolution  to  stand  or  fall  by  whatever  is  seen  to  be  for  God  and 
for  which  he  is  working.  Then  will  the  spiritual  process  grow  in  strength 
and  completeness.  "Be  ye  perfect,  as  your  Father  in  heaven  is  perfect," 
begins  to  be  realized  in  climbing 

"The  world's  great  altar  stairs, 
Which  slope  through  darkness  up  to  God." 

This  gives  an  ultimate  standard  of  worth,  an  ideal  of  growth  in  char- 
acter. The  perfection  of  the  excellency  of  personality  is  the  highest 
object  of  pursuit  which  all  highest  living  implies,  and  towards  which  all 
right  spiritual  growth  tends.  Reverence  awakens  aspiration  for  com- 
pleteness in  God,  not  as  having  attained,  but  striving  to  attain,  thus  com- 
bining the  lowliest  humility  with  effort  for  the  highest,  with  a  faith 
bordering  on  vision,  culminating  in  a  life  serene  and  radiant,  the  imper- 
sonation of  the  Christ  life. 

"  Here  shalt  thou  find  rest, 
O  weary  one!     Herfe  thou  may'st  cease  thy  quest. 
Give  thyself  up.     He  leads  where  thou  shalt  go." 

In  reverencing  God  we  reverence  humanity  through  him.  In  loving 
him  we  love  his  children.  Man  is  served  in  serving  God.  Consecration, 
or  the  self-devotement  and  dedication  of  one's  entire  being  in  a  complete 
self-surrender  to  God  and  his  service,  is  inclusive  of  the  same  to  man. 
As  the  heavenly  Father  causes  his  rain  and  sunshine  to  fall  alike  on  all, 
cares  for  the  lilies  and  the  sparrows,  and  numbers  the  hairs  of  the  heads 
of  his  children,  so  to  be  devoutly  conscious  of  this  awakens  a  desire  to 
return  love,  gratitude,  and  service  for  love  and  care,  to  be  in  union  with 
him  and  in  union  with  his  work,  to  lose  one's  self  and  selfishness  in  this 
all-embracing  beneficence.  Thus  coming  into  accord  with  tiie  divine 
purposes,  we  become  co-workers  with  God  in  the  realization  of  these 
purposes.  Godward  reverence,  love,  and  consecration  as  the  primal 
fountain,  has  thus  an  outward  flow  upon  our  fellow-men,  companions  in 
the  blessings  of  this  sonship.  All  separateness,  strangeness,  and  antag- 
onizing distinctions  disappear  in  an  all-embracing  fellowship  and  harmony, 
and  a  oneness  of  life  and  aim  spring  up.     This  is  grounded  in  the  con- 


SERMONS. 


Z7^ 


scioLis  assurance  that  God  is  Father  and  all  men  are  brethren.  These 
divine  and  human  relationships  constitute  at  once  an  ideal  good  and  an 
ideal  obligation,  that  of  mutual  aid  in  the  development  of  personal  char- 
acters, and  through  them  of  society.  The  ultimate  standard  of  worth  is 
personal  worth.  Spiritual  progress  springs  from  the  perfecting  of  this 
worth.  This  can  be  completely  realized  only  through  the  aids  furnished 
by  society.  Society  supplies  conditions  for  the  development  of  the  high- 
est personal  character — not  in  the  gratification  of  the  social  impulses  for 
enjoyment  and  pleasure,  but  in  meeting  reciprocal  obligations,  and  per- 
forming the  services  imposed  by  mutual  good  will.  It  is  only  in*the 
intercourse  of  man  with  man,  each  under  the  guidance  and  inspiration  of 
these  high  ideals,  that  the  vital  source  of  all  human  good  is  found,  and 
each  really  lives  to  the  ends  of  both  individual  completeness  and  the 
completeness  of  all.     This  is  the  parent  of  all  progress  and   civilization. 

The  ideal  man  is  he  who  accepts  and  lives  out  these  great  principles. 
His  prayer  is,  "Thy  will  be  done  in  me  and  through  me,"  himself  work- 
ing freely  and  joyfully  to  this  end.  His  doing  becomes  thereby  both  a 
continual  prayer  and  a  continual  thank  offering.  Thus  he  finds  his  high- 
est fruition  in  faith,  in  reverence,  in  humility,  in  aspiration  for  the  absorp- 
tion of  his  will  in  the  divine  will.  Herein  he  finds  in  Christ  the  embodied 
ideal  of  all  he  seeks.  Christ  presents  to  him  the  human  side  of  God,  the 
divine  side  of  humanity,  not  alien  or  differing  in  kind.  The  union  in  him 
of  the  divine-human  is  typical,  is  the  ideal  embodiment  and  expression  of 
the  best  possibilities,  the  incarnated  divine-human  life  in  its  highest  form. 
This  union  makes  one  a  joint  heir  with  him  both  of  character  and  of 
inheritance — inheritance  because  of  character — a  divine-human  charac- 
ter, whose  fruitage  is  "love,  joy,  peace,  long-suffering,  gentleness,  good- 
ness, faith,  meekness,  temperance."  Without  this  indwelling  presence 
and  life  of  the  divine  no  strong  and  earnest  girding  of  the  will,  no  stren- 
uous effort,  will  avail  in  a  high  and  ideal  spiritual  life. 

All  epochs  in  which  this  high  faith  and  living  prevail  are  elevating, 
brilliant,  and  fruitfiil  in  growth,  for  both  the  present  and  future.  All 
epochs  in  which  doubt  or  unbelief  maintain  a  sad  triumph,  vanish  with- 
out leaving  anything  good  or  great.  They  that  lift  the  world,  first  in 
faith, 

"  Its  sharp,  rocky  heights  to  catch  far  morning 
Above  all  the  nights  of  this  world,  must  climb." 

Young  friends,  there  is  an  indescribable  attraction  about  youth  when 
in  reverence  and  hope  it  gathers  and  concentrates  its  vigor  for  the  mas- 
tery of  life.     The  budding  of  young  and  untried  gifts,  the  manifestation 


3/2 


LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 


of  high  graces,  the  kindling  of  divine  fires,  the  joy  and  aspiration  awak- 
ened in  the  presence  of  high  ideals,  give  promise  and  assurance  that  pres- 
ent attainments  will  mature  into  those  still  larger  and  higher.  This  is 
especially  true  when  these  ideals  are  comprehensive  enough  to  include 
the  whole  range  of  an  endless  existence,  with  its  ever-growing  possibili- 
ties. Through  your  preparatory  training  you  have  been  getting  to 
yourselves  character,  acquiring  power.  Now  as  you  enter  the  arena  of 
your  life-work,  efficiency  and  purpose  are  especially  demanded. 

No  thoughtful  person  can  stand  fronting  life's  opening  vistas  and  see 
the  world's  future  rising  before  him  without  a  sense  of  the  greatness  and 
the  seriousness  of  life  springing  up  within  him.  May  this  awaken  you 
to  an  abiding  earnestness  and  enthusiasm  for  noble  and  effective  living. 
This  will  go  far  in  shaping  the  nature  of  your  influence  upon  both  the 
present  and  the  future;  for  you  will  have  much  to  do  with  forming  the 
character  of  society  and  of  institutions  that  will  tell  upon  other  genera- 
tions. Amid  toils  and  distracting  cares  never  lose  sight  of  this  high 
purpose  of  life,  nor  faith  in  man's  sublime  destiny. 

Opportunity  stands  holding  wide  the  door  for  some  of  you  to  go  forth 
to  your  place  in  the  world's  work ;  to  others  she  will  present  only  the 
key  with  which  to  unlock  and  open  the  door  for  yourselves — perchance, 
with  an  effort  requiring  all  your  strength  and  skill;  but  for  all  the  places 
will  be  held  only  through  your  own  energy,  uprightness,  industry,  and 
untiring  perseverance.  The  crowning  fortune  is  to  be  born  with  a  bent. 
If  thus  fortunately  endowed,  be  what  God  intended  you  for,  and  life  will 
be  a  joy  and  a  success.  Be  anything  else,  and  it  will  be  a  fret  and  a 
failure.  What  the  child  dreams  the  youth  endeavors  and  the  man 
achieves.  One  is  not  simply  to  be  good,  but  good  for  something.  In 
seeking  your  work,  see  to  it  that  you  are  called  to  it  by  your  aptitudes, 
by  all  that  is  best  and  bravest  in  you,  and  by  the  divine  providences  that 
are  shaping  the  ends  of  your  lives.  See  to  it,  also,  that  it  is  something 
that  the  world  needs,  something  that  shall  give  worthy  and  fruitful 
results,  results  that  shall  ultimately  win  the  approval  of  the  world's  best. 
Life  should  not  be  a  haphazard  affair,  but  with  a  definite  and  assigned 
mission,  and  work  which  shall  have  a  true  significance  and  glory  in  its 
accomplishment.  Get  to  yourselves  ideas  and  definite  opinions,  clean  and 
clear  cut,  reenforced  by  large,  sound,  good,  all-round  common  sense,  free 
from  fine  fancies  and  wild  vagaries,  the  whole  utilized  by  practical  skill. 
A  character  thus  strengthened  and  toughened  in  all  of  its  thews' and  sin- 
ews is  prepared  to  lead  the  average  world.  Coming  thus  to  the  estate 
of  your  life-work,  well  considered,  well  chosen,  and  definite,  give  both 


SERMONS.  TfJT) 

hands  to  it.  Rejoice  in  it.  Bend  all  your  energies  to  it  with  invincible 
determination  and  resistless  energy  till  achievement  is  assured.  With- 
out this,  neither  opportunity  nor  talent  will  avail.  Be  assiduous,  abste- 
mious, frugal  without  stinginess,  indifferent  to  ease  or  pleasure.  Do 
your  work  wisely,  solidly,  thoroughly.  Let  not  show  nor  sham  have 
place  or  part  therein.  Never  be  maddened  or  mastered  by  difficulty  or 
opposition.     Let  rather  vehemence  become  clear  insight,  calm  wisdom. 

Knowledge  should  be  not  only  a  means  of  livelihood  but  a  means  of 
manhood  as  well.  Be  something  as  well  as  know  something.  Get  to 
yourselves,  not  only  a  strong  and  well-balanced  mind,  but  likewise  a 
sound  and  well-rounded  character.  All  things  are  to  the  intent  of  work- 
ing together  for  your  highest  good  by  developing  your  entire  nature. 
To  secure  this  end,  you  must  needs  bend  and  mould  these  conditions  and 
relations  into  aids  for  becoming  constantly  more  and  more  proficient  in 
intelligence,  in  reasonableness  and  largeness  of  view,  in  refinement  and 
dignity,  in  beneficence,  with  increasing  facility  in  serving  others,  in  grace 
and  the  charm  and  attracting  persuasiveness  which  spring  from  the  con- 
stant endeavor  after  perfectness.  This  endeavor  will  promote  a  harmo- 
nious and  symmetrical  growth,  and  perfect  all  sides  of  your  nature. 
Cold  and  cloud  and  storm  are  as  needful  to  this  end  as  sunshine  and  dew 
and  gentle  showers.  Everything  gives  divine  results  when  rightly 
received  and  used. 

While  using  these  instrumentalities  for  your  own  upbuildiiig,  you 
will  likewise  be  using  them  for  the  upbuilding  of  humanity.  In  doing 
so  better  spend  your  energy  in  seeking  to  build  up  your  own  ideals, 
and  in  making  your  own  convictions  prevail,  than  in  undermining  and 
tearing  down  those  of  others.  Act  and  react  upon  the  world  to  your 
utmost  power,  but  only  to  the  end  of  enlightening,  reforming,  improving. 
This  may  beget  opposition  and  collision.  Christ,  though  increasing  in 
favor  with  God  and  man  through  his  preparatory  years,  yet  when  he 
entered  upon  his  great  mission,  came  into  such  sharp  collision  with  man 
that  the  rebound  sent  him  to  Calvary  and  the  cross.  In  his  footsteps 
must  walk  all  who  greatly  lift  and  bless  their  fellows.  Ridicule,  abuse, 
misrepresentation,  and  ostracism  have  taken  the  place  of  the  cross,  the 
manacle,  and  the  fagot,  yet  inspired  by  the  same  spirit.  Though  subject 
to  these  things  while  living,  after  ages  hold  their  names  in  grateful 
remembrance.  It  has  been  well  said  that  those  whom  the  present  can- 
nonades, the  future  will  canonize.  All  true  work  is  undying,  ever  grow- 
ing, multiplying,  and  fruiting.  There  is,  therefore,  no  occasion  for  faint- 
heartedness   or    discouragement.      Though    the    work    be    humble    and 


374 


LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 


commonplace,  yet,  if  greatly  done,  it  may  be  the  means  of  producing 
superb  characters  and  inspiring  lofty  sentiments.  If  one  works  under 
manifold  adversities,  or  amid  opposition,  persecution,  or  neglect,  yet  if 
the  work  be  done  in  the  spirit  of  consecration  to  the  highest  well-being 
of  man,  the  future,  if  not  the  present,  will  recognize  and  bless  the  worker. 

"At  the  inmost  core  of  thy  being  is  a  burning  fire. 
From  thine  own  altar-flame  kindled  in  the  hour  when  souls  aspire. 
That  which  thou  wouldst  be,  thou  must  be;  that  which  thou  shalt  be,  thou  art. 
Thine  is  the  crag  path  chosen.     On  the  crest  shalt  thou  rest  thy  feet." 

It  is  both  a  duty  and  a  privilege  thus  to  live  and  work  as  in  the  pres- 
ence and  under  the  guidance  of  God.  It  lifts  above  the  mists  and  vapors 
of  the  common  evironments  of  everyday  life  cares  into  the  clear,  calm 
light  and  air  of  the  spiritual  world  ever  round  about  us,  and  in  which  it 
is  the  privilege  of  each  consciously  and  constantly  to  dwell.  Dwelling 
thus  in  the  light  whose  source  is  in  the  Life  Eternal,  your  lives  will  not 
be  as  the  sough  and  wail  of  the  east  wind,  nor  as  the  moan  of  waves 
breaking  on  the  silent  shores  of  eternity;  but,  rather,  as  the  spirit  voice 
of  the  JEolian  harp,  or  as  the  music  of  the  great  cathedral  organ,  with  its 
many  pipes  and  stops  and  banks  of  keys. 

Men  may  come  and  men  may  go,  individual  lives  floating  like  leaves 
upon  the  stream  of  time  till  lost  in  the  great  ocean  of  eternity,  but  "the 
river  of  the  water  of  life,"  "preceding  out  of  the  throne  of  God  and  of  the 
Lamb,"  shall  flow  on  forever,  full  and  more  full,  purifying  and  life  giving. 
Be  ye  partakers  of  this  water  of  life.  Be  ye  completely  charactered  in 
the  perfections  of  Him  who  continually  increased  "in  favor  with  God  and 

man ; "  for, 

"  Be  the  day  weary,  or  be  the  day  long, 
At  length  it  ringeth  to  evening  song." 


SERMONS.  375 


DIWIME    GUIDANCE    AND    HELP. 

[Baccalaureate  sermon  delivered  before  the  graduating  class  of  Alfred  University, 
June  21,  1891.] 

"Hitherto  hath  the  Lord  helped  us."      i  Sam.  7:12. 

At  the  semicentennial  commencement,  five  years  ago,  the  theme  of 
discourse  was  "The  College,  a  Light;"  two  years  ago  it  was  "The  Col- 
lege Community — Its  Work."  On  this,  the  fifty-fifth  anniversary,  let  us 
consider  in  what  way  the  Lord  has  guided  us,  and  by  what  ineans  he  has 
lielped  us  in  meeting  and  fulfilling  the  demands  of  our  high  calling.  To 
this  end,  let  us,  as  a  family  circle,  gather  around  the  cheerful  hearthstone, 
beneath  the  protecting  roof-tree  of  our  Alma  Mater,  draw  the  curtains, 
shutting  out  the  glare,  drive,  and  noise  of  the  great  world,  and  look  back 
through  the  years  and  recall,  as  best  we  inay,  the  ways  in  which  we  have 
been  guided  and  helped  by  divine  agencies. 

Samuel  could  say,  "Hitherto  hath  the  Lord  helped  us,"  from  the 
assurance  that  hitherto  he  had  been  obedient  to  His  will,  and  from  child- 
hood followed  His  guidance.  When  one  can  say,  "Thy  will  be  done  in 
and  by  me,"  and,  like  Samuel,  can  say,  "Speak;  for  thy  servant  heareth," 
then,  and  not  till  then,  is  he  prepared  to  be  helped  of  the  Lord.  God 
does  not  do  man's  work;  but  he  assists  the  willing  and  obedient,  both 
from  within  and  from  without — from  within,  by  promptings  and  illumi- 
nation; from  without,  by  opening  the  doors  of  opportunity  and  by  the 
supply  of  means.  "A  man's  heart  deviseth  his  way,  but  the  Lord  direct- 
eth  his  steps."  When  He  purposes  to  lead  man  to  fine  issues,  however 
small,  it  is  by  ways  of  His,  not  man's  devising.  Man  is  made  to  realize 
that  it  is  not  his  own  wish,  or  wisdom,  or  strength,  but  a  higher  purpose, 
a  broader  plan,  and  a  stronger  hand,  than  his  own,  that  are  shaping  the 
movements  and  determining  the  results.  All  highest  things  are  reached 
through  this  guidance  and  help.  This  divine  intention  respecting  each  is 
what  each  one  is  privileged  to  do  and  become.  Failing  in  this,  he  fails  in 
all  that  is  best  for  him;  but  thus  led  and  helped  and  nurtured  of  God,  his 
life  becomes  complete  and  divinely  beautiful,  sacred  and  significant. 
What  dignity  does  this  give  to  life,  what  support  in  trials,  what  inspi- 
rations to  excellence — always  under  his  guidance,  always  with  his  help, 
leading  on  to  the  best  possible  achievement! 

This  directing  is  frequently,  indeed  generally,  quite  different  from 
what  human  planning  would  have  arranged.  It  has  not  been  through 
pleasant  ways  and  rich  domains  that  man  has  been  led  to  his  highest  and 
best  estate.     Many  of  the  foremost  peoples  who  have  led  on  and  shaped 


3/0  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

civ^ilizations,  have  not  chosen  their  own  environments;  but,  as  the  apostle 
declares,  God  "hath  determined  the  times  before  appointed  and  the 
bounds  of  their  habitation."  Most  of  the  men  and  women  who  have  been 
potent  factors  in  shaping  the  destinies  of  their  fellows,  who  have  been  the 
originators,  organizers,  and  promoters  of  all  that  is  best  for  human  weal, 
have  had  their  home  breeding  amid  conditions  unpropitious,  as  human 
thinking  goes  have  "dipped  their  morsels  in  the  vinegar  and  gall  of  life," 
and  of  morsels  thus  dipped  have  eaten  daily.  The  same  is  true  of  fami- 
lies, communities,  and  institutions.  It  is  only  as  the  great  results  achieved 
have  cast  their  light  backward,  that  all  these  conditions  are  seen  to  have 
been  for  the  best,  and  to  have  been  shaped  by  a  superintending  provi- 
dence. Also,  the  perplexities,  the  bafiflings,  the  trials,  crosses,  disappoint- 
ments, losses,  though  heavy  to  be  borne  at  the  time,  are  seen,  in  the  light 
of  these  fine  results,  to  be  providential  blessings.  It  is  only  through  toil 
and  suffering  and  sacrifice,  only  amid  opposition  and  conflict,  that  the 
best  comes  to  man,  that  all  human  progress  has  been  made. 

Seneca  says,  "  Men  venerate  the  fountains  whence  important  streams 
take  their  rise."  In  this  spirit  and  in  the  light  of  the  principles  stated, 
let  us  look  back  to  the  sources  whence  this  Institution  sprang,  note  the 
inspiring  principles,  the  formative  influences  shaping  it,  and  the  provi- 
dences guiding  and  helping  it.  Probably  no  one  entering,  seventy  years 
ago,- this  shut-in  valley, — a  sort  of  eagle's  nest  in  the  mountains, — sur- 
rounded by  hills  still  clothed  with  the  primeval  forest,  and  far  removed 
from  the  great  stream  of  migration  and  the  centers  of  trade,  with  only  the 
vague  echoes  of  the  hum  of  the  busy  world  reaching  it,  would,  at  a  first 
glance,  have  thought  it  a  fit  place  for  a  seat  of  learning.  But  now,  in  view 
of  what  is,  one  can  see  things  and  conditions  not  a  few,  not  only  fit,  but 
fittest,  for  such  a  seat.  Its  elevated  position — its  hilltops  twenty-two 
hundred  feet  above  sea  level — its  pure  mountain  airs,  and  all  climatic 
conditions,  are  conducive  to  health,  vigor,  and  alertness,  both  physical 
and  mental,  possessing,  thus,  those  attributes  which  have  contributed  his- 
torically to  free,  brave,  vigorous  growth  and  culture.  It  is  found,  also, 
to  be  a  most  fit  place  for  practical,  scientific  training,  a  wonderfully  rich 
and  varied  museum  of  nature's  own  collecting,  ranging  through  geology, 
paleontology,  botany,  and  zoology.  In  the  picturesque  character  of  its 
scenery  it  furnishes  a  great  variety  of  material  for  the  art  student.  The 
aesthetic  sentiments  are  constantly  appealed  to  and  nurtured,  and  it  sup- 
plies constant  inducements  to  the  study  of  the  beautiful  in  nature.  Its 
shut-in  character,  excluding,  to  a  large  extent,  the  outward  world,  with 
its  temptations,  is  favorable  to  culture. 


SERMONS.  377 

With  these  natural  endowments  fitting  it  for  a  seat  of  learning,  it  was 
ready  to  be  utilized  to  that  end  by  man.  For  pioneer  settlers  there  came, 
not  only  here,  but  into  all  this  region,  a  people  with  a  strain  both  of  blood 
and  mind  from  the  best  racial  stock  the  world  knows.  "Blood  tells"  is 
an  old  and  approved  adage.  But  mind  tells  more  persistently  and  effect- 
ively than  blood.  Mentality,  constituting  the  spiritual  organism,  per- 
petuates its  characteristics  more  certainly  and  unvaryingly  than  physical 
conformation.  Ethics  or  racial  mentality  is  one  of  the  primary  forces  in 
civilization. 

These  pioneers  brought  mental  characteristics  of  solidity,  endurance, 
pluck,  force,  daring,  ingenuity,  adaptiveness,  versatility,  agile  self-recovery 
of  footing,  a  taste  and  aptitude  for  work,  and  a  distaste  for  idleness, 
pleasure,  and  sham.  They  brought  all  these  qualities  into  exercise  in  this 
then  rugged  wilderness  region,  to  get  grip  and  win  bread,  as  they  hewed 
down  the  forests,  subdued  the  stubborn  soil,  and  built  rude  homes. 

Better  still,  they  brought  a  taste  and  aptitude  for  Christian  homes, 
churches,  and  schools.  They  built,  side  by  side,  amid  stumps,  brush 
and  log  heaps,  beneath  the  shades  of  the  great  forest,  the  home,  the 
church,  and  the  school.  The  Lord  has  promised  to  honor  those  that 
honor  and  serve  him  in  their  lives. 

From  their  taste  for  learning,  the  common  school,  under  the  inspira- 
tion of  able  and  enterprising  teachers,  had,  from  the  start,  a  vigorous 
growth.  This  produced  mental  unrest  and  a  desire  for  broader  and 
higher  culture.  The  spirit  of  progress,  like  leaven,  pervaded  the  com- 
munity. The  young,  cherishing  a  desire  for  learning,  were  ready  and 
waiting  for  the  opening  door  of  opportunity.  Thus  it  came  to  pass  that 
in  scarcely  more  than  a  score  of  years  after  the  forests,  with  their  deer, 
wolves,  and  bears,  began  to  disappear  from  the  region,  the  enterprise  of 
higher  education  was  inaugurated.  This  enterprise  did  not,  as  frequently 
is  the  case,  originate  from  without,  but  from  within  the  community;  nor 
was  a  hothouse  method  in  the  form  of  a  large  gift  of  money  applied,  as 
is  quite  customary  of  late  years;  but  it  sprang  from  native  seed,  planted 
and  nurtured  through  long  years.  The  energy  was  internal  and  healthy. 
What  were  the  conditions  of  things  here  at  that  time?— The  village 
contained  only  some  thirteen  buildings  of  various  kinds  and  uses,  which 
were  mostly  small,  one  storied,  unpainted,  and  unfinished.  The  farms 
round  about  were  but  partially  cleared  and  mostly  unpaid  for.  The 
church  was  a  mile  away,  to  which  the  people,  clothed  in  "homespun," 
went  in  lumber  wagons  in  summer  and  in  sleighs  in  winter,  to  listen  to 
an  unsalaried,  self-taught,  and  largely  self-supporting  ministry.     The  post 


378  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

ofifice  was  two  miles  away,  to  which  the  mail,  consisting  of  a  few  letters 
with  an  unpaid  twenty-five-cent  postage,  and  a  small  assortment  of  weekly 
papers,  was  brought  once  a  week  on  horseback. 

The  mode  of  getting  here  from  the  outside  world  was  described  by 
Professors  Irish  and  Kenyon.  The  former  wrote:  "Railroads  were 
then  unknown  west  of  Utica,  and  a  passage  from  Schenectady  to  Alfred 
had  the  vicissitudes  of  a  wide  range  of  locomotion — a  night  ride  on  an 
engine  facing  a  snowstorm  to  Utica,  a  trip  on  a  canal  boat  amid  ice 
blockades  and  delays  to  Geneva,  a  ride  in  a  lumber  wagon  to  Almond, 
thence  afoot  in  snow,  slush,  mud,  and  fog  to  Alfred."  Professor  Kenyon 
wrote:  "From  Schenectady  to  Utica  by  rail,  thence  to  Syracuse  by  stage 
—eighteen  hours,  often  stuck  in  the  mud,  breaking  down  twice;  thence 
to  Geneva  by  rail;  thence  to  Bath  by  stage;  from  Bath  to  Alfred  afoot, 
traveling  over  hill  and  down  dale,  through  mud  and  snow,  seeing  for  the 
first  half  of  the  distance  nothing  but  wilderness  and  log  houses." 

"As  to  the  place,  I  like  it  much.  It  is  rather  hilly;  no  more  so,  how- 
ever, than  to  afford  an  agreeable  variety.  On  the  whole,  it  is  a  very 
pleasant  country,  fully  answering  my  expectations.  As  to  the  people,  I 
discover  nothing  of  ostentation  or  show.  Their  dress  is  plain  and  neat, 
but  not  extravagant,  their  manners  simple  and  unaffected,  free  and  cor- 
dial. I  consider  them  far  superior  to  those  who  make  such  great  preten- 
sions to  superior  excellency.  I  am  also  much  pleased  with  the  students. 
There  are  many  that  may  be  considered  excellent  scholars  in  the  branches 
they  have  pursued.  I  have  been  led  to  entertain  an  exalted  opinion  of 
them.  In  short,  I  am  much  pleased  with  the  place  and  the  people. 
Whether  I  shall  continue  to  be  thus  satisfied,  I  pretend  not  to  predict." 

Such  was  the  condition  of  the  country  and  the  people  at  the  inception 
of  the  Institution.  Springing  from  such  causes,  amid  such  environments, 
it  did  not  start  into  being  to  satisfy  the  wishes  of  any  particular  class,  call- 
ing, profession,  or  pursuit,  but  to  meet  a  felt  want,  voicing  itself,  irrespec- 
tive of  calling,  class,  race,  color,  or  sex.  When  the  germinal  school 
opened,  on  the  5th  of  December,  1836,  in  a  sma:ll  upper  room  of  a  private 
dwelling,  it  swung  wide  its  doors  to  all,  from  those  advanced  in  years  and 
scholarships  down  through  the  various  grades  to  the  boy  of  thirteen 
years,  who  neither  knew  the  multiplication  table  nor  could  write  his  own 
name.  The  school  was  founded  and  all  studies  arranged  to  meet  the 
common  wants  of  all  classes.  Its  scope  has  enlarged  as  the  demands  and 
the  ability  to  meet  them  have  increased;  yet  all  the  growth  that  has  come 
to  it  was  in  the  germ  at  the  beginning.  All  has  come  of  development 
from  within.     Nothing  has  been  patched  on  from  without.     It  was  founded 


SERMONS.  379 

by  earnest,  common-sense  men,  to  meet  the  cry  of  their  children  for  the 
common  bread  of  knowledge,  and  it  has  continued  in  order  to  satisfy  this 
hunger  of  humanity. 

When  Moses  set  up  the  tabernacle  in  the  wilderness,  the  people  of 
Israel  "came,  both  men  and  women,  as  many  as  the  Spirit  of  the  Lord 
made  willing-hearted,  and  brought  whatever  they  had  to  spare,  as  the 
Lord's  offering  to  the  work."  In  this  spirit  and  by  similar  means  have 
been  founded  not  a  few  colleges,  Alfred  among  the  number.  It  had  its 
foundations  laid  by  means  of  small  contributions,  not  always  of  money, 
but  of  "whatever  they  had  to  spare,"  for  the  people  were  poor.  Tlie 
students,  more  often  then  than  now,  paid  in  work  or  material  from  the 
farm.  For  instance,  the  boy  who  could  not  write  his  name,  paid  his 
first  tuition  of  ^3.00  by  furnishing  four  cords  of  four-foot  wood — green 
beech — which  the  principal,  on  his  part,  worked  up  for  the  stove.  To 
aid  in  seating  the  schoolroom,  each  student  brought  a  chair.  This  In- 
stitution's chief  mission  has  been  to  the  poor.  This  fact  has  given  type, 
tone,  and  destiny  to  it.  Herein  has  it  been  approved  and  blessed  and 
helped  of  God. 

It  has  been  well  said  that  every  college  bell  in  a  new  region  is  a 
genuine  missionary  to  the  people  of  that  region,  awakening  all  within  its 
sound  to  new  and  higher  intellectual  life  and  activity,  inducing  improve- 
ment, culture,  progress.  Such  a  missionary  was  the  small  but  silvery- 
toned  bell  on  the  little  one-story  building,  the  first  erected.  Responsive 
to  this  call,  came  eager  young  men  and  women  from  all  the  surround- 
ing region.  To  accommodate  this  constantly-increasing  ingathering, 
the  few  and  small  houses  were  insufficient;  but  their  owners  threw 
open  their  doors,  and  gave  up  every  available  space  to  the  incomers, 
and  when  the  houses  were  full  to  overflowing,  rooms  in  wood  sheds 
and  even  barns  were  fitted  up  and  occupied.  Many  sought  rooms  out- 
side of  the  village,  while  young  men  whose  homes  were  within  four  or 
five  miles  quite  generally  came  and  went  daily.  Though  the  accommo- 
dations were  meager,  memory  does  not  recall  any  instance  of  complain- 
ing of  rooms,  board,  or  any  other  limiting  conditions. 

All,  teachers  and  students,  caught  the  inspirations  of  the  dawning 
hght  of  the  new  day,  and  jubilantly  worked  therein  w'ith  Spartan  hardi- 
hood and  manly  bravery  and  good  will.  The  dayspring  of  this  new 
light  rising  upon  the  youth  of  this  region,  hitherto  living  comparatively 
barren,  commonplace  lives,  with  no  broad  and  bright  outlook,  filled  them 
with  an  enthusiasm  not  easily  understood  by  those  who  have  lived  con- 
stantly in  the  light  of  schools.     To  the  students  of  those  days  the  school 


^8o  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

and  all  of  its  appointments,  though  formative,  incomplete,  and  limited, 
had  the  freshness  and  vigor  of  their  own  youth.  It  met  and  satisfied 
their  felt  needs  for  a  higher  culture,  at  the  same  time  opening  to  them  a 
larger  and  richer  realm  of  life,  giving  glimpses  of  higher  possibilities  of 
attainments  and  usefulness,  thus  awakening  unbounded  enthusiasm,  and 
nerving  to  earnest  endeavor.  These  new  opportunities  for  culture  were 
gladly  accepted  and  eagerly  improved,  the  many  inconveniences  and 
privations  incident  to  the  new  and  incomplete  state  of  things  being 
cheerfully  accepted. 

It  is  not  the  size  of  a  school,  but  the  spirit,  that  is  of  chief  value, 
and  the  spirit  here  in  those  early  days  was  most  admirable.  Those 
attending  only  for  a  short  time  caught  the  spirit  pervading  the  air,  and, 
though  the  amount  of  book  knowledge  may  have  been  small,  yet  they 
went  forth  to  the  work  of  life  with  a  new  force  impelling  them.  Of 
course  there  was  then,  as  ever,  more  or  less  dross  thrown  off  in  the 
process.  The  lazy  sometimes  drifted  in,  the  evil  sometimes  crept  in,  or 
shouldered  themselves  in;  but  the  climate  was  not  congenial,  and  their 
stay  was  usually  short. 

The  enthusiasm  of  the  school  was  supplemented  and  augmented  by 
that  of  the  citizens.  They  took  almost  as  much  interest  in  the  work  as 
the  students  themselves.  They  were  frequent  visitors,  especially  pn  such 
great  occasions  as  rhetoricals  and  examinations.  Written  examinations 
had  not  then  become  the  vogue,  were,  indeed,  unknown,  as  was  also 
marking,  grading,  and  placing.  The  aim  was  to  make,  not  simply  stu- 
dents, but  men  and  women  who  could  think  accurately  and  speak  and 
act  promptly  on  their  feet,  with  clear,  level  heads  and  dexterous  hands. 
These  examinations,  consequently,  created  great  interest,  and  were  lis- 
tened to  by  crowded  houses,  composed  not  only  of  students,  but  also  of 
citizens  of  this  and  adjoining  towns.  At  such  times  every  now  and  then 
one,  with  the  vigor  and  alertness  of  a  trained  athlete,  parrying  the  thrusts 
of  quick  questionings,  meeting  attacks  from  all  points,  conquering  every 
difficulty  on  the  instant,  rushed  on  to  the  goal  with  the  endurance  and 
dash  of  an  ancient  Greek  runner,  amid  the  enthusiasm,  if  not  the  plaudits, 
of  a  goodly  cloud  of  witnesses. 

The  anniversary,  held  at  first  in  the  chapel,  on  that  becoming  too 
small  moved  to  the  church,  a  mile  away,  and  on  overflowing  that  tak- 
ing to  the  grove,  was  the  great  event  of  the  year,  there  not  being  so 
many  great  events  yearly  as  now.  The  people  in  all  the  region  round 
about  then  took  much  more  lively  interest  than  since  it  has  become  one 
oft-repeated  tale.     They  poured  in  by  the  thousand,  by  all  modes  of  con- 


SERMONS.  381 

veyance,  from  the  ox  team  down.  The  exercises  lasted  all  day,  with  a 
brief  intermission  for  lunch,  often  sixty  or  seventy  students  participating 
— the  boys  speaking  and  the  girls  reading. 

A  literary  society,  at  first  called  the  Alfred  Debating  Society,  taking 
later  the  name  of  the  Franklin  Lyceum,  the  parent  of  the  present  literary 
societies,  was  organized  the  first  term  of  the  school.  It  awakened  an 
interest  akin  to  that  of  the  other  exercises.  Not  only  students,  but  citi- 
zens, including  the  middle-aged  and  elderly  men,  enrolled  themseUes  as 
members,  coming  from  two  to  four  miles  to  participate  or  listen. 

We  have  dwelt  thus  long  on  the  bygone,  long-dead  days,  and  on  the 
spirit  of  the  workers  and  of  the  school  of  those  days,  that  we  might 
catch  a  glimpse  of  the  formative  influences  which  went  to  the  shaping  of 
the  Institution  and  determining  its  mission.  While  it  is  a  great  privilege 
to  be  a  member  of  an  institution  which  has  a  history  whose  atmosphere 
is  suffused  with  inspiring  memories,  in  whose  halls  are  abiding  presences, 
whose  influence  is  ever  for  good,  yet  it  is  a  greater  privilege  to  be  a 
member  of  an  institution  which  is  just  inaugurating  these  influences, 
where  everything  has  a  morning  freshness  and  joy,  the  inspirations 
awakened  by  the  originations  and  imitations,  the  vigor  of  youth  and 
hope,  the  stir  and  rush  of  a  new  enterprise.  It  was  amid  these  influences 
that  teachers  and  students  lived  and  wrought  during  these  early  years. 
They  all  felt  that  they  were  helping  inaugurate  a  noble  enterprise,  work- 
ing in  the  bright  dawning  of  a  glorious  day.  The  teachers  eagerly 
sought  the  most  approved  methods  of  instruction  and  of  study.  The 
students  readily  accepted  all  change  looking  to  this  end,  rendering 
hearty  approval  to  all  efforts  for  the  improvement  of  scholarship,  man- 
ners, or  morals.  Even  the  morning  lectures  at  the  chapel  were  accepted 
as  good  to  both  teacher  and  student, — to  the  former,  as  leading  them 
outside  of  their  routine  work  and  the  ruts  that  such  work  tends  to  run 
in;  to  the  latter,  in  presenting  them  with  motive  and  purpose,  not  got 
from  text-books  or  classroom  drill,  leading  them  to  realize,  in  some 
degree,  at  least,  that  right  manly  men  and  right  womanly  women,  noble 
charactered,  are  of  far  greater  import  than  simply  scholarly  adepts. 

Alfred  University  had  its  origin  in  a  response  to  the  cry  of  the  people 
for  more  light.  It  has  grown  up  naturally  as  the  trees  grow,  from  the 
common  soil  of  the  common  wants  of  the  people.  "  Give  us  more  light," 
is  the  ever-increasing  cry  of  humanity.  Christian  philanthropy  is  increas- 
ingly responding  to  this  cry.  Formerly  the  college  was  for  a  class,  or 
classes,  not  for  the  masses.  Now  it  is  becoming  more  and  more  planned 
and  equipped  to  meet  the  wants  of  the  masses.     All  the  recent  move- 


3o2  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

ments  in  education,  the  public  school  enlargements,  University  extension 
plans,  Chautauqua  plans,  all  have  this  end  in  view.  Alfred  from  the  first 
has  kept  it  in  view.  It  has  ever  attempted  to  voice  the  longings  of  the 
people,  and  to  meet  and  shape  and  satisfy  these  longings,  believing  them 
to  be  the  manifestations  of  divine  purposes  respecting  man.  Its  training 
and  culture  have  ever  been  for  use  rather  than  ornament  or  pleasure. 
It  has  ever  sought  to  make  its  students  self-reliant,  independent,  afraid 
of  no  honest  work. 

It  has  gone  farther.  Having  the  love  of  God  and  man  as  the  great 
and  impelling  motive  for  its  existence  and  its  work,  it  has  sought  from 
the  beginning  to  make  prevail  more  and  more  among  men  the  divine 
love  and  rule,  as  manifested  in  Christ  and  his  kingdom.  Imbued  with 
this  spirit,  it  has  been  from  the  start  deeply  religious,  earnestly,  even 
radically,  reformatory.  It  imbued  its  students  more  or  less  with  the 
same  spirit,  preparing  them  to  go  forth  as  e\'angels,  reformers,  leaders  in 
all  the  enterprises  having  for  their  end  the  bettering  of  human  conditions 
or  doing  away  with  evil  and  wrong  that  blind  and  bind  men. 

In  meeting  these  all-pervasive  human  needs  the  first  demand  was 
for  the  recognition  of  the  needs  and  the  consequent  rights  of  woman. 
From  the  year  505  a.  d.,  when  a  great  council  of  divines  gravely  debated 
the  question  whether  woman  ought  to  be  called  a  human  being;  to  the 
time  when  she  was  reluctantly  permitted  to  eat  at  the  same  table  with 
man;  to  the  time  when  she  was  grudgingl}^  allowed  to  learn  the  alphabet, 
the  same  as  man;  to  the  present,  when,  amid  no  little  opposition,  she  has 
been  admitted  to  all,  or  nearly  all,  of  the  more  progressive  colleges  of 
the  land — though  many  of  the  older  ones,  founded  on  the  monastic  plan, 
hold  to  their  celibate  condition  with  a  tenacity  which  is  "  more  pathetic 
than  wise" — has  this  struggle  been  going  on.  From  the  start,  woman 
has  had  here  equal  rights  and  privileges  with  man.  At  its  founding  no 
woman  in  all  the  land,  if  in  any  land,  held  a  collegiate  or  professional 
degree.  None  were  regularly  licensed  physicians,  law}'ers,  or  ordained 
ministers  of  the  gospel.  Now  there  are  thousands  bearing  such  degrees, 
and  thousands  more  in  training  for  them — hundreds  of  women  in 
the  professions,  and  hundreds  more  preparing  to  enter  them.  In  all 
this,  Providence  has  manifestly  been  guiding  and  helping  woman,  and 
will  help  on  to  still  broader  and  higher  equalities;  and  woman,  we  doubt 
not,  will  in  the  future,  as  in  the  past,  amply  vindicate  her  right  to  these. 
In  all  this  Alfred  has  ever  sought  to  follow  the  lead  of  Providence  and 
do  what  it  could  to  fulfill  the  divine  intent. 

In  the  development  of  this  equalit)%  some  modifications   have  taken 


S'ERMONS.  2^8  T, 

place,  as  the  years  have  gone  by.  In  illustration,  in  the  early  times 
the  studies  of  ladies  and  gentlemen  were  more  diverse  than  now.  But 
few  of  the  ladies  studied  the  higher  mathematics  and  very  seldom 
the  ancient  languages.  On  the  other  hand,  gentlemen  very  seldom 
studied  the  modern  languages  and  never  the  fine  arts.  The  ladies  never 
thought  of  speaking  on  public  occasions.  They  are  not  permitted  to  do 
so  even  now  in  some  of  the  so-called  most  radical  institutions.  For  the 
first  decade  the  ladies  had  no  literary  society  for  mutual  mental  drill  and 
for  improvement  in  speaking.  As  the  years  have  increased,  all  studies 
and  exercises  have  become  more  and  more  alike.  In  this  the  ladies 
have  held  more  than  an  even  hand.  In  a  coinparison  extending  over 
many  years,  and  including  all  branches  of  study,  it  has  been  found  that 
their  average  standing  is  two  per  cent  higher  than  that  of  the  gentlemen. 
In  the  matter  of  speaking  on  public  occasions,  it  is  quite  generally  con- 
ceded that  the  ladies,  as  a  whole,  are  more  eloquent,  if  such  a  thing  be 
possible,  than  the  gentlemen.  The  gentlemen  may  display  the  more 
oratory,  speaking  from  the  head;  but  the  ladies  express  the  more  elo- 
quence, speaking  from  the  heart — the  source  of  all  true  eloquence. 

Again,  the  apostle  Paul  tells  us  that,  though  God  hath  made  of  one 
blood  all  nations,  yet  he  hath  determined  their  times  and  the  bounds  of 
their  habitation,  to  the  end  that  they  should  seek  after  and  find  him. 
Nations  thus  placed  have  a  divinely-appointed  diversity  in  fulfilling  their 
missions,  corresponding  to  their  diverse  habitats  and  environments. 
This  applies  with  equal  force  to  communities,  families,  individuals,  and 
institutions.  The  diverse  missions  of  colleges  are  determined  by  their 
condition,  constituency,  and  ends  to  be  sought  in  meeting  the  demands 
of  these.  As  in  the  natural  world  the  environments  of  climate  and  soil 
determine  the  kind  and  quality  of  the  vegetation  of  a  region,  so  the  loca- 
tion and  environment  of  a  college  largely  determine  its  mission.  While 
agreeing  in  fundamentals,  institutions  neither  can  nor  should  be  precisely 
alike  in  details.  Seats  of  learning,  to  have  their  happiest  influence,  need 
to  be  sown  broadcast  arrlong  the  people,  and  to  be  sustained  by  their 
sympathies  and  their  liberalities. 

Alfred,  from  the  very  nature  of  its  origin,  location,  environments,  and 
constituency,  belongs  to  the  latter  class,  and  it  is  devoutly  believed  that 
in  this  the  Lord  has  had  the  guidance,  and  is  helping  it  on  in  the  way  he 
is  moving  in  human  advancement.  Formerly  the  divorce  of  learning  from 
life  was  the  rule;  now  there  is  a  constantly  increasing  demand  for  learning 
to  give  significance  to  life.  The  scholar  must  not  be  a  pedant  but  a  power. 
He  is  more  and  more  estimated  by  the  skill  with  which  he  brings  his 


382  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

ments  in  education,  the  public  school  enlargements,  University  extension 
plans,  Chautauqua  plans,  all  have  this  end  in  view.  Alfred  from  the  first 
has  kept  it  in  view.  It  has  ever  attempted  to  voice  the  longings  of  the 
people,  and  to  meet  and  shape  and  satisfy  these  longings,  believing  them 
to  be  the  manifestations  of  divine  purposes  respecting  man.  Its  training 
and  culture  have  ever  been  for  use  rather  than  ornament  or  pleasure. 
It  has  ever  sought  to  make  its  students  self-reliant,  independent,  afraid 
of  no  honest  work. 

It  has  gone  farther.  Having  the  love  of  God  and  man  as  the  great 
and  impelling  motive  for  its  existence  and  its  work,  it  has  sought  from 
the  beginning  to  make  prevail  more  and  more  among  men  the  divine 
love  and  rule,  as  manifested  in  Christ  and  his  kingdom.  Imbued  with 
this  spirit,  it  has  been  from  the  start  deeply  religious,  earnestly,  even 
radically,  reformatory.  It  imbued  its  students  more  or  less  with  the 
same  spirit,  preparing  them  to  go  forth  as  evangels,  reformers,  leaders  in 
all  the  enterprises  having  for  their  end  the  bettering  of  human  conditions 
or  doing  away  with  evil  and  wrong  that  blind  and  bind  men. 

In  meeting  these  all-pervasive  human  needs  the  first  demand  was 
for  the  recognition  of  the  needs  and  the  consequent  rights  of  woman. 
From  the  year  505  a.  d.,  when  a  great  council  of  divines  gravely  debated 
the  question  whether  woman  ought  to  be  called  a  human  being;  to  the 
time  when  she  was  reluctantly  permitted  to  eat  at  the  same  table  with 
man;  to  the  time  when  she  was  grudgingly  allowed  to  learn  the  alphabet, 
the  same  as  man;  to  the  present,  when,  amid  no  little  opposition,  she  has 
been  admitted  to  all,  or  nearly  all,  of  the  more  progressive  colleges  of 
the  land — though  many  of  the  older  ones,  founded  on  the  monastic  plan, 
hol'd  to  their  celibate  condition  with  a  tenacity  which  is  "  more  pathetic 
than  wise" — has  this  struggle  been  going  on.  From  the  start,  woman 
has  had  here  equal  rights  and  privileges  with  man.  At  its  founding  no 
woman  in  all  the  land,  if  in  any  land,  held  a  collegiate  or  professional 
degree.  None  were  regularly  licensed  physicians,  lawyers,  or  ordained 
ministers  of  the  gospel.  Now  there  are  thousands  bearing  such  degrees, 
and  thousands  more  in  training  for  them — hundreds  of  women  in 
the  professions,  and  hundreds  more  preparing  to  enter  them.  In  all 
this,  Providence  has  manifestly  been  guiding  and  helping  woman,  and 
will  help  on  to  still  broader  and  higher  equalities;  and  woman,  we  doubt 
not,  will  in  the  future,  as  in  the  past,  amply  vindicate  her  right  to  these. 
In  all  this  Alfred  has  ever  sought  to  follow  the  lead  of  Providence  and 
do  what  it  could  to  fulfill  the  divine  intent. 

In  the  development  of  this  equality,  some  modifications   have  taken 


SERMONS.  383 

place,  as  the  years  have  gone  by.  In  illustration,  in  the  early  times 
the  studies  of  ladies  and  gentlemen  were  more  diverse  than  now.  But 
(ew  of  the  ladies  studied  the  higher  mathematics  and  very  seldom 
the  ancient  languages.  On  the  other  hand,  gentlemen  very  seldom 
studied  the  modern  languages  and  never  the  fine  arts.  The  ladies  never 
thought  of  speaking  on  public  occasions.  They  are  not  permitted  to  do 
so  even  now  in  some  of  the  so-called  most  radical  institutions.  For  the 
first  decade  the  ladies  had  no  literary  society  for  mutual  mental  drill  and 
for  improvement  in  speaking.  As  the  years  have  increased,  all  studies 
and  exercises  have  become  more  and  more  alike.  In  this  the  ladies 
have  held  more  than  an  even  hand.  In  a  comparison  extending  over 
many  years,  and  including  all  branches  of  study,  it  has  been  found  that 
their  average  standing  is  two  per  cent  higher  than  that  of  the  gentlemen. 
In  the  matter  of  speaking  on  public  occasions,  it  is  quite  generally  con- 
ceded that  the  ladies,  as  a  whole,  are  more  eloquent,  if  such  a  thing  be 
possible,  than  the  gentlemen.  The  gentlemen  may  display  the  more 
oratory,  speaking  from  the  head;  but  the  ladies  express  the  more  elo- 
quence, speaking  from  the  heart — the  source  of  all  true  eloquence. 

Again,  the  apostle  Paul  tells  us  that,  though  God  hath  made  of  one 
blood  all  nations,  yet  he  hath  determined  their  times  and  the  bounds  of 
their  habitation,  to  the  end  that  they  should  seek  after  and  find  him. 
Nations  thus  placed  have  a  divinely-appointed  diversity  in  fulfilling  their 
missions,  corresponding  to  their  diverse  habitats  and  environments. 
This  applies  with  equal  force  to  communities,  families,  individuals,  and 
institutions.  The  diverse  missions  of  colleges  are  determined  by  their 
condition,  constituency,  and  ends  to  be  sought  in  meeting  the  demands 
of  these.  As  in  the  natural  world  the  environments  of  climate  and  soil 
determine  the  kind  and  quality  of  the  vegetation  of  a  region,  so  the  loca- 
tion and  environment  of  a  college  largely  determine  its  mission.  While 
agreeing  in  fundamentals,  institutions  neither  can  nor  should  be  precisely 
alike  in  details.  Seats  of  learning,  to  have  their  happiest  influence,  need 
to  be  sown  broadcast  arriong  the  people,  and  to  be  sustained  b}'  their 
sympathies  and  their  liberalities. 

Alfred,  from  the  very  nature  of  its  origin,  location,  environments,  and 
constituency,  belongs  to  the  latter  class,  and  it  is  devoutly  believed  that 
in  this  the  Lord  has  had  the  guidance,  and  is  helping  it  on  in  the  way  he 
is  moving  in  human  advancement.  Formerly  the  divorce  of  learning  from 
life  was  the  rule;  now  there  is  a  constantly  increasing  demand  for  learning 
to  give  significance  to  life.  The  scholar  must  not  be  a  pedant  but  a  power. 
He  is  more  and  more  estimated  by  the  skill  with  which  he  brings  his 


384  LIFE    OF    TRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

learning  to  bear  upon  the  busy  world,  puts  himself  in  touch  and  sympa- 
thy with  its  moving  forces,  transmuting  learning  into  influence.  That 
learning  is  best  which  best  fits  for  life  and  life's  manifold  problems.  A 
man  may  be  a  bookworm,  a  scientist,  a  linguist,  a  logician,  a  mental 
gymnast  generally,  without  being  a  man  of  culture  in  a  large  and  true 
sense,  with  ability  to  appreciate,  appropriate,  and  use  the  best  of  all  the 
ages,  bringing  it  to  bear  upon  the  on-moving  stream  of  influences.  To 
this  end  he  must  not  be  a  grave  in  which  to  bury  learning,  but  a  fruitful 
soil,  in  which  learning  shall  spring  up  into  a  hundred-fold  beneficent 
harvest.  Such  an  education  does  the  divine  Providence  call  for,  and  such 
has  Alfred  been  seeking  to  give. 

Another  essential  and  pervasive  principle  determining  all  develop- 
ment, progress,  has  from  the  beginning  operated  in  this  Institution,  deter- 
mining its  peculiar  character.  It  is  operating  more  and  more  in  most 
institutions  of  learning.  Herbert  Spencer  formulated  it  as  the  progress 
from  uniformity  to  definite  diversity.  The  apostle  Paul  long  before  rec- 
ognized it  in  the  spiritual  world.  He  tells  us  there  is  a  diversity  of  gifts, 
but  all  from  the  selfsame  Spirit.  This  is  a  universal  law,  applying  alike 
to  the  physical  and  the  spiritual  realms.  Creation  advances  from  the 
lower  to  the  higher  through  the  differentiation  of  species  and  of  parts, 
leading  to  complexness  and  perfectness  of  wholes,  and  to  diversity  and 
definiteness  of  uses,  resulting  in  development  and  progress.  This  law 
applies  to  man,  his  institutions  and  industries.  As  civilization  advances, 
the  diversity  in  institutions,  customs,  and  industries — in  all  things  that 
go  to  effecting  this  civilization — increases. 

This  law  applies  to  educational  institutions  and  processes  with  special 
emphasis.  In  former  times,  with  their  fewer  callings  and  simpler  indus- 
tries, with  less  diverse  and  exacting  demands,  institutions  of  learning 
could  have  a  correspondingly  simple  and  uniform  course  of  study  and 
methods;  but  advancing  civilization,  with  its  ever-increasing  diversity 
and  complexness,  demands  institutions  that  shall  train  both  men  and 
women  not  only  for  the  learned  professions,  but  for  all  these  diverse  and 
exacting  pursuits.  Such  institutions  must  adapt  themselves  to  the  needs 
of  their  constituency.  Diversity  amid  uniformity  is  therefore  increas- 
ingly demanded.  This  diversity  should  spring  from  and  thereby  be 
adapted  to  the  environments  and  the  results  sought  to  be  attained. 
Strong,  healthy  germinal  principles,  high  type,  and  favoring  environ- 
ments will  produce  noble  outgrowth  and  diverse  fruitage  under  the  nur- 
turing care  of  a  protecting  Providence. 

But  lying  back  of   all  this  there  is    a  more  primary  question  still. 


SERMONS.  385 

Shall  education  wait  upon  and  follow  bent,  aptitude,  or,  like  Procrustes, 
put  all  on  the  same  bedstead  and  make  them  fit  by  chopping  them  off,  if 
too  long,  by  stretching  them  out,  if  too  short?  Waiving  the  question  of 
what  would  be  an  ideal  education  if  there  were  no  individual  bents  and  no 
work  lay  beyond,  the  very  present  insisting  question  is,  in  the  presence  of 
the  rapidly  multiplying  and  diverse  studies,  with  a  correspondingly  rapid 
increase  in  diverse  industries  and  pursuits,  and  the  diverse  individual 
aptitudes  that  have  given  birth  to  these,  what  is  the  education  demanded  ? 
An  overruling  and  guiding  Providence  is  answering  that.  God  is  guid- 
ing even  goading  man  on  in  these  multiform  and  diverse  ways,  and  it  is  in 
vain,  even  if  so  disposed,  to  kick  against  the  goads.  This  demands  that, 
while  holding  fast  to  these  essentials  in  all  education  corresponding  to 
the  essential  elements  and  powers  of  human  nature,  the  superadded 
differentiations  shall  be  sufficient  to  meet  the  requirements  of  the  diver- 
gencies of  this  same  human  nature  and  of  modern  progress. 

From  the  very  founding  of  this  institution  its  class  of  students  has 
notably  differentiated  it  from  many  others.  These  have  been  largely 
from  the  working  classes.  They  come  here  to  better  fit  themselves,  not 
chiefly  for  the  learned  professions,  nor  to  fit  themselves  simply  to  live 
and  enjoy  themselves  without  work,  but  for  going  out  into  the  varied  and 
multitudinous  pursuits  of  the  present  complex  civilization.  These, 
through  their  varied  needs,  demanded  a  wide  and  varied  range  ot  studies. 
Thus  the  problem  from  the  beginning  has  been  how  best  to  prepare 
intelligent,  noble,  masterful  workers — a  most  difficult  task  surely.  In 
most  institutions  at  that  time  the  method  of  Procrustes  was  largely  fol- 
lowed. They  all  had  essentially  one  and  the  same  unvarying  course  of 
study,  and  but  few  outside  the  candidates  for  the  learned  professions 
entered  them.  Only  two  degrees,  with  perhaps  an  exception  or  two, 
exclusive  of  honorary  ones,  were  conferred,  A.  B.  and  A.  M.  The  latter 
was  not  conferred  for  studies  pursued  in  college. 

But  within  this  time  the  circle  of  knowledge  has  become  so  enlarged 
in  its  sweep,  by  the  rapid  increase  of  new  sciences,  new  literatures,  new 
industries,  creating  complexity  and  diversity,  demanding  diversity  of 
culture,  that  it  is  no  longer  possible  to  include  even  the  rudiments  of 
these  demands  within  the  compass  of  a  single  course,  and  most  colleges 
have  been  compelled  to  institute  either  electives  leading  to  the  same 
degree,  or  different  courses  leading  to  different  degrees.  Harvard,  for 
instance,  has  two  hundred  and  fifteen  varying  courses  leading  to  the  degree 
of  A.  B.,  and  many  other  institutions  have  similar  though  not  as  great  a 
variety.     At  present,  exclusive  of  honorary  degrees,  there  are  between 


25 


386  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

thirty  and  forty,  probably  nearer  forty  than  thirty,  different  degrees  con- 
ferred by  the  various  educational  institutions  entitled  to  confer  degrees, 
representing  differing  courses  of  study. 

When  Alfred  first  found  it  necessary  to  formulate  a  course  of  study 
in  addition  to  the  traditional  one,  only  a  single  college  could  be  found 
with  a  course  to  serve  as  a  pattern  after  which  to  work.  When  it 
became  entitled  to  confer  degrees,  it  made  diligent  search  for  a  distinctive 
and  appropriate  degree  for  ladies,  but,  finding  none,  it  was  obliged  to 
originate  one,  that  of  Laureate  of  Arts;  but  after  employing  it  twenty- 
four  years,  it  was  discontinued  at  the  instance  of  the  ladies  themselves, 
other  colleges  in  the  meantime  having  largely  adopted  the  same  degree 
for  both  ladies  and  gentlemen.  This  institution  was  one  of  the  first,  if 
not  the  first,  to  establish  a  distinctive  course  leading  to  the  degree  of  Ph. 
B.  Now  there  are  scores  of  colleges  with  such  courses.  The  various 
courses  leading  to  new  degrees,  in  most  institutions  adopting  them, 
ranged  at  first  from  one-half  to  two-thirds,  in  the  amount  of  study  and 
the  time  required,  as  the  requirements  for  the  regular  classical  degree; 
but  in  most  institutions  they  have  been  gradually  increased.  In  this 
respect,  this  institution  has  kept  in  the  front  ranks  till  all  courses  have 
equal  requirements,  while  not  a  few  institutions  have  not  yet  this  equality 
of  requirements. 

Another  most  important  question  agitating  the  college  world  at  the 
present  is  respecting  the  time  students  should  be  kept  in  school.  Curi- 
ously, the  advocates  for  shortening  the  time  are  found  chiefly  not  in  the 
smaller  but  in  the  larger  schools.  If  the  time  is  decreased,  the  income 
from  tuition  will  be  decreased.  This  will  affect  the  smaller  much  more 
seriously  than  the  larger  and  stronger  schools.  They  must  either  have 
the  four  years'  tuition  or  have  their  endowments  increased.  While  the 
European  scholar  completes  both  his  collegiate  and  professional  studies 
at  the  average  age  of  twenty-two  years,  twenty-one  in  France,  the 
American  scholar  completes  his  at  the  average  of  twenty-five  or  six 
years.  As  the  president  of  Michigan  University  said  in  a  recent  address, 
the  American  student  by  the  time  he  gets  ready  for  work  is  old  enough 
to  be  not  only  a  father  but  a  grandfather.  As  a  result  of  this  increasing 
length  and  cost  of  this  education,  the  young  men  are  more  and  more 
passing  by  the  college  on  their  way  to  their  professions.  The  proportion 
of  the  college  educated  in  the  professions  is  decreasing  year  by  year. 
President  Hall,  of  Clark  University,  in  a  recent  article  states  that  from 
direct  investigation  he  found  that  of  the  students  in  our  schools  of  theol- 
ogy, only  twenty-three   per   cent    were    college    graduates;  in   the    law 


SERMONS.  387 

schools,  only  ei<;hteen  per  cent,  and  in  those  of  medicine,  only  eight  per 
cent.  This  is  a  bad  and  an  alarming  state  of  things  for  all  parties  con- 
cerned,— bad  for  the  preacher  and  bad  for  his  hearers,  bad  for  the  lawyer 
and  bad  for  his  clients,  bad  for  the  physician  and  very  bad  for  his  patients. 

How  is  all  this  to  be  remedied?  Certainly  not  by  insisting  on  the 
time  element  as  the  one  of  chief  importance,  not  by  arranging  courses 
and  time  to  suit  those  of  average  ability,  or  below,  and  then  compelling 
all,  both  the  quick  paced  and  the  slow  paced,  to  keep  the  same  step,  and 
that  not  of  the  quick,  but  of  the  slow,  not  by  trying  to  pacify  and  quiet 
the  quick  by  administering  vitiating  and  corrupting  opiates  in  the  form 
of  honors,  prizes,  and  all  that,  thereby  substituting  for  pure  love  of 
learning  for  learning's  sake,  petty  rivalries  and  selfish  ambitions,  degrad- 
ing alike  to  genuine  scholarship  and  to  true  manhood. 

Thomas  Jefferson  long  ago  found  and  applied  the  true  remedy.  In 
founding  the  University  of  Virginia  he  was  inspired  by  the  same  spirit 
of  freedom  as  when  he  penned  the  Declaration  of  Independence,  freedom 
of  choice  in  studies  and  freedom  of  mo\'ement  in  working  out  those 
choices.  The  time  element  was  ignored.  Quality  and  thoroughness, 
not  time,  he  made  the  only  standard.  A  young  man  with  brains  and 
pluck  can,  and  often  has,  if  well  prepared  on  entering,  completed  the 
course  in  two  years,  while  the  illy  prepared,  the  slow  paced,  or  dull, 
require  four,  five,  and  even  six  years  to  complete  the  same.  The  bright 
and  enterprising  are  not  checked  in  their  pace  and  made  to  travel  the 
same  gait  as  the  slow  by  either  compulsion  or  by  the  bait  of  prizes  and 
honors.  The  principles  and  inducements  for  getting  on  and  up  that  con- 
trol are  the  same  as  in  the  world's  broader  arena.  The  wisdom  of  the 
system  has  been  amply  vindicated  from  Jefferson  down  to  the  present. 
No  institution  in  America  has,  in  proportion  to  its  members,  sent  out  so 
many  men  who  have  held  commanding  positions  in  the  nation,  with  such 
controlling  influences,  as  the  University  of  Virginia.  Most  of  the  south- 
ern and  southwestern  institutions  are  patterned  more  or  less  after  it,  and 
all  others  must,  soon  or  late,  through  compulsion,  if  not  otherwise,  fol- 
low closely  or  afar  off.  The  proposed  new  University  of  Chicago  is  to  be 
organized  on  essentially  the  same  plan.  President  Harper  says  that  a 
student  will  be  permitted  to  graduate  whenever  he  can  pass  the  requisite 
examinations. 

This  Institution  has,  from  the  start,  pursued  essentially  the  same 
course.  The  nature  of  its  patronage  demanded  it.  Most  of  its  students 
have  been  those  who  were  not  only  preparing  to  be  bread  winners  in  the 
future,  but  who,  to  a  greater  or  less  degree,  have  been  compelled  to  be 


388 


LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALL.EN. 


such  all  through  their  preparation.  Thus  their  studies  have  been  more 
or  less  interrupted,  and  they  were  thereby  unable  to  pursue  an  unhin- 
dered or  continuous  course;  yet  such,  appreciating  both  their  oppor- 
tunities and  the  value  of  time,  have  generally  been  earnest  and  successful 
workers,  making  up  for  these  drawbacks  by  greater  industry  and  enter- 
prise, not  only  making  up,  but  forging  ahead. 

In  the  German  universities  students  are  allowed  three  to  five  years  to 
complete  their  studies,  but  comparatively  few  outside  of  those  preparing  for 
professional  or  official  positions  study  for  degrees,  constituting  only  twenty 
to  twenty-five  per  cent  of  the  whole  number.  It  is  estimatad  by  the  uni- 
versity authorities  that  not  more  than  thirty-three  per  cent  of  those  in 
attendance  are  real  workers.  In  the  great  English  universities,  though 
the  nominal  time  is  four  years,  few  remain  more  than  three.  The  real 
workers  are  estimated  at  about  twenty-five  per  cent  of  the  whole  number. 
In  this  country  it  is  asserted  that  idleness  and  play  increase  in  proportion 
to  the  number  and  wealth  of  those  in  attendance;  while  in  the  smaller 
institutions,  patronized  largely  by  those  of  limited  means,  the  proportion 
of  hard  workers  is  much  greater. 

A  student  without  money  and  who  has  his  way  to  win  in  the  world, 
if  he  has  brains  and  pluck,  needs  but  little  coercing  or  regulating  or  aid- 
ing, by  either  the  punishments  or  rewards  usually  applied.  He  is  more 
susceptible  to  honor  than  to  honors,  to  the  noble  inspiration  of  a  useful 
life  that  stands  before  him,  beckoning  him  on.  Permit  such  an  one  to 
select  studies  congenial  to  his  tastes,  those  suiting  his  inborn  bent,  and 
which  he  sees  will  best  fit  him  for  that  sphere  in  life  to  which  his  apti- 
tudes point,  and  he  will  spontaneously  become  earnest,  quick  paced,  and 
alert,  with  enthusiasm  at  whice  heat — just  the  state  for  taking  on  true 
culture  readily  and  rapidly.  Distasteful  or  abhorrent  tasks,  resulting  in 
dawdling,  listless,  half-hearted  endeavors,  lifeless  routine  work,  never  so 
long  continued,  producing  only  smoldering  fires  and  dull  heat  at  best, 
never  bring  true  culture.  As  iron  can  be  welded  only  at  white  heat,  so 
only  souls  aglow  with  enthusiasm  are  in  a  fit  condition  for  best  culture. 
As  forests  simply  sway  and  moan  in  wintry  winds  and  wintry  sunlight, 
waiting  to  be  thrilled  into  new  life  and  growth  by  the  ardent  heats  of 
summer,  so  the  mind  remains  dormant  till  stirred  by  the  fervors  enkin- 
dled by  worthy  purposes  and  congenial  work.  Enthusiasm  sets  all  the 
powers  in  motion,  fires  the  soul  with  the  love  of  knowledge,  awakens 
spiritual  life  and  high  purpose. 

A  college  residence  should  have  an  elevating  and  refining  influence 
on  life  and  character,  enabling  one  to  get  a  stalwart  and  many-sided  man- 


SERMONS.  389 

liness,  thus  evolving  all  that  is  noblest  and  best.  The  object  of  all  true 
culture  is  to  enlarge  and  invigorate,  through  a  knowledge  of  the  lofty 
thoughts  and  actions  of  men  of  all  times,  and  through  a  knowledge  of 
the  universe  and  of  the  Creator  thereof,  and  thereby  awaken  both  a  men- 
tal and  moral  earnestness.  Colleges  should  be  for  the  outpouring  of 
strong,  courageous  lives  into  all  that  come  under  their  influence,  to  the 
end  of  awaking  all  their  latent  powers  under  leaders  of  insight  and  faith, 
who  seek  to  produce  fruitful  lives,  create  admiration  for  all  that  is  whole- 
some and  best,  give  courage  to  conquer  all  difficulties,  and  induce  defi- 
nite aims  and  the  heeding  of  calls  to  the  service  of  humanity.  A  highly 
effective  school,  like  a  highly  effective  individual,  everywhere  and  every- 
when,  is  surcharged  with  its  personality  and  the  force  springing  from  its 
aims.  The  work  which  it  has  undertaken  inspires  all  having  to  do 
therewith,  vitalizing  the  energies  of  all.  It  is  not  simply  a  machine 
accomplishing  a  given  task,  but  adds  the  more  effective  force  of  free  work- 
impelled  by  enthusiasm.  Enthusiasm  for  the  work  in  hand  attracts  and 
generates  enthusiasm  in  others,  thus  continually  augmenting  its  power. 
One  soul  on  fire  kindles  others.  Such  work,  not  with  a  part,  but  with 
their  whole  being  and  entire  strength.  The  important  thing  in  the 
schoolroom  is  not  the  recitation,  but  the  pervading  spiritual  atmosphere, 
the  incentive,  the  inspiration  to  enlightenment,  issuing  in  uses.  This  is 
the  important  thing.  This  is  what  gives  lasting  results.  This  is  its  own 
great  reward.  Is  a  school  working  for  cleverness  or  for  character?  This 
is  the  significant  question.  Effort  for  right  noble  growth,  more  than  pre- 
cise routine  with  figured  results,  enlisting  all  the  powers  of  the  student, 
should  be  the  aim;  not  selfishness,  or  fear,  or  emulation,  or  ambition  to 
shine.  The  endeavors  of  the  spirit  that  lead  to  ideal  growth  and  conse- 
crated living  are  above  all  other  undertakings  to  which  the  mind  of  man 
can  bend  itself,  and  should  be  forever  uppermost.  Such  are  ever  seeking 
to  climb  into  higher  and  perpetually  broadening  regions  of  truth  and 
beauty,  rising  like  mountain  peaks  round  about,  misty  and  dim  in  their 
infinitudes,  and  gathering  an  ever-increasing  humility  in  the  presence  of 
these  infinitudes  in  comparison  with  the  little  already  attained.  As  is  the 
quality  of  the  bloom  and  the  fragrance  of  ripened  fruit,  so  is  the  quality 
of  character  ripened  under  such  endeavor.  This  gives  the  noblest 
rewards.  The  highest  dignity  springs  from  the  inner  approval  of  efforts 
to  grow  in  wisdom  and  spiritual  power. 

"So  will  the  shine 
Of  soul  that  strikes  on  soul  make  fair  and  fine 
This  earthly  tenement.     Thou  shalt  extol 
The  inner  that  the  outer  lovelier  seem." 


190 


LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 


With  such  a  great  work  before  him,  the  teacher  should  come  to  his 
profession  in  the  spirit  of  consecration,  not  as  to  a  mere  hvelihood  or 
handicraft.  Such  cannot  stand  with  their  faces  turned  to  the  past,  copy- 
ing and  repeating  the  dead  past,  but  standing  and  acting  in  the  Hving 
present,  with  their  faces  to  the  future,  seeking  to  see  the  way  God  is 
going  and  leading  humanity,  and  striving  to  understand  the  demand  of 
the  times,  and  of  God  in  reference  to  the  future.  He  needs,  if  he  is  to 
meet  the  living  demands  of  his  position,  to  be  more  than  a  dictionary,  or 
a  characterless  and  impersonal  promulgator  of  facts,  a  peddler  of  data. 
He  needs  to  bring  his  students  into  living  relations  to  present  civilization 
and  progress.  He  should  not  only  have  knowledge  to  enlighten,  but, 
likewise,  a  noble  and  winning  personal  inspiration,  be  a  former  and 
reformer  of  character.  He  should  be  able  to  set  the  expanding  faculties 
of  youth  into  healthy  activity  by  careful  and  sympathetic  guidance,  lead- 
ing to  the  love  of  all  that  is  most  wholesome  and  best,  to  all  that  is  true 
and  beautiful  and  good,  and  stimulate  to  an  earnest  endeavor  for  their 
acquisition.  He  should  use  planned  courses  and  prescribed  rules  of 
procedure,  not  to  cramp  and  stifle  individuality,  but  to  broaden  and 
strengthen  it,  securing  thereby  a  development  that  is  symmetrical,  pro- 
portional, and  harmonious.  The  world  is  full  of  men  and  women  whose 
narrow  and  ruling  passion  is  money,  or  fashion,  or  notoriety,  by  whom 
all  the  most  valuable  and  sacred  possibilities  of  life  are  despised  or  neg- 
lected, and  life  itself  becomes  barren  and  worthless,  both  to  the  possessor 
and  to  the  world.  To  counteract  this,  the  interests  and  purposes  of  life 
need  to  be  broadened  and  elevated  to  a  standpoint  where  the  successes 
or  failures  of  earthly  striving  shall  be  seen  as  simply  the  accidental  and 
unimportant,  wherein  the  real  self  is  unaffected,  and  above  which  one 
may  stand,  free,  serene,  and  sublime.  In  doing  it  the  teacher  needs  the 
true  up-gush  of  the  soul,  fresh  and  buoyant,  the  outright  flash  of  spon- 
taneous fervor,  simplicity,  clearness,  strength,  directness,  force,  effective- 
ness, which,  like  sacred  tongues  of  flame,  shall  kindle  what  is  best  in 
each.  Whoever  fulfills  this  high  calling  is  faithful  to  one  of  the  most 
important  and  sacred  trusts  coming  to  man. 

Such  has  ever  been  the  high  aim  of  this  Institution,  however  far  short 
it  may  have  fallen  in  the  realization.  Though  often  halting,  stumbling, 
groping,  yet  it  has  ever  striven  towards  this  ideal.  Everything  here  is 
the  result  of  toil  and  sacrifice,  consecrated  with  prayer  to  God  and 
humanity.  These  buildings  had  their  very  foundations  laid  and  conse- 
crated in  prayer;  their  walls  rose  through  toil  and  sacrifice.  They  stand 
not  as  a  bane,  but  as  a  benediction.     Its  founders  and  upbuilders  lived 


SERMONS.  391 

and  worked  in  the  inspirations  springing  from  a  faith  that  they  were 
working  under  divine  guidance  and  with  divine  help,  and  we  have  entered 
into  their  labors.  They  set  a  light  amid  these  mountain  heights  to 
lighten  us  and  all  others  that  shall  gather  here.  Though  we  live  in  the 
present,  the  past  lives  and  shines  in  and  through  us. 

"  Heaven  does  with  us  as  we  with  torches  do, 
Not  light  them  for  themselves  ;  for  if  our  virtues 
Did  not  go  forth  of  us,  'twere  all  alike 
As  we  had  them  not.     Spirits  are  not  finely  touched 
But  for  fine  issues." 

Torches  lighted  at  this  light  are  not  lighted  for  themselves  alone, 
but  to  be  borne  forth  for  the  lighting  of  the  world. 

Let  us,  then,  carefully  and  reverently  feed  this  sacred  flame,  as  the 
high  priest  fed  the  golden  candlestick  in  the  temple  at  Jerusalem,  with 
finest  oil,  that  it  go  not  out  by  night  nor  by  day,  as  long  as  man  shall 
need  light  from  its  light. 


392 


LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 


THE    TRUE    EDUCATION 


[Preached  at  the  First  Alfred  Church,  Sabbath   morning,  November   5,   1892,  by 
the  Rev.  Dr.  T.  R.  Williams,*  and  requested  for  publication.] 

"Buy  the  truth,  and  sell  it  not;  al.so  wisdom,  and  instruction,  and 
understanding."     Prov.  23:23. 

I  have  been  asked  to  speak  briefly  of  President  Allen's  life-work  in 
its  relation  to  the  church  and  the  denomination.  To  do  this  it  will  be 
proper  first  to  give  some  conception  of  his  ideal  of  a  Christian  education. 
That  ideal  is  indirectly  expressed  by  the  words  of  counsel  which  he  so 
frequently  repeated  in  one  way  or  another:  "Buy  the  truth,  and  sell  it 
not."  It  will  serve  our  purpose  now  and  here  to  bring  together  some 
of  his  own  terse,  graphic,  and  forceful  words  on  this  subject,  which  moved 
his  heart  and  life  in  never-to-be-forgotten  eloquence. 

First,  on  the  value  of  knowledge,  and  how  wealth  may  be  transmuted 
into  life: — 

"Home  growth,  self-culture,  mentally,  spiritually,  religiously,  is  our 
great  work.  Learning,  like  the  gospel,  knocks  as  kindly  at  the  door  of 
the  log  house  as  of  the  mansion.  Ministry,  service,  sacrifice,  is  the  mis- 
sion of  life.  Christianity  is  founded  on  sacrifice.  The  cross  is  not  only 
the  light  of  our  hopes,  but  also  the  pattern  after  which  life  is  to  be 
moulded.  We  are  the  stewards  of  divine  bounties.  Justice  is  cold. 
Domestic  love  and  friendship  are  often  partial  or  selfish.  Philanthropy, 
the  love  of  man  as  man,  is  unselfish,  impartial,  generous,  and  obeys  the 
broader  and  higher  impulses.  Everything  that  ministers  to  want,  that 
brings  comfort  and  cheer,  whatever  secures  justice  and  peace  or  adds  to 
culture,  science,  art,  religion,  goes  to  the  service  of  life's  great  end.  One 
may  accumulate  property  at  the  behests  of  charity  for  the  relief  of  the 
penniless,  homeless,  friendless,  orphaned,  widowed,  the  hungry,  the 
naked,  sick — all  this  is  benevolence;  but  higher  is  that  benevolence 
which  gives  enlightenment  and  culture  to  the  ignorant,  reclaims  the 
erring,  sends  the  gospel  to  the  destitute,  builds  churches,  forms  schools. 
Benevolence,  kindness,  liberality,  win    the    heart-thrones   of  the  world. 


*Dr.  Thomas  R.  Williams,  a  professor  at  Alfred  in  the  early  days,  and  afterward 
for  many  years  at  the  head  of  the  Theological  Department,  was  always  a  sympathetic 
friend  of  Mr.  Allen,  and  with  him  ever  stood  ready  to  sacrifice  all  personal  interests 
for  the  good  of  the  Institution.  His  last  sermon,  "The  True  Education,"  was  made 
up  of  extracts  from  Mr.  Allen's  written  works  on  that  subject.  Before  bringing  for- 
ward the  next  one  of  the  series.  Dr.  Williams,  too,  was  called  to  lay  down  life's  bur- 
dens and  enter  into  the  "  rest  that  remaineth  for  the  people  of  God." 


SERMONS. 


393 


Charity  makes  the  bleak,  selfish  world  warm  and  bright,  the  sweet  abode 
of  tenderness  and  joy.  Practical  philanthropy  is  one  of  the  divinest  sum- 
mits of  human  attainment,  lifting  the  world  itself  into  sunnier  regions, 
where  the  light  is  more  brilliant,  the  earth  fairer,  the  air  sweet  as  the 
breath  of  heaven.  Angels,  even  God  himself,  unites  with  man  in  min- 
istries of  love.  Glorious  will  be  the  time,  radiant  the  earth,  when  each 
shall  be  the  friend  and  aid  of  his  fellow,  each  shall  seek  the  good  of  all. 
Earnest  laborer  in  the  world's  great  field,  scatter  peace  and  joy  till  thine 
own  rest  comes. 

''Money  Transformed  into  Cnlturc.—AW  labor,  all  money,  that  does 
not  rise  above  the  physical,  and  is  not  transformed  immediately,  or 
mediately,  into  life,  growth,  power,  is  dead  dross. 

"The  angel  of  beauty  plants  flowers,  shrubbery,  trees,  hard  by  the 
door  of  home  or  school,  to  shake  down  beauty  upon  all  passers-b}',  all 
over  the  fields  to  gladden  the  hearts  of  beholders,  all  along  the  walls 
and  fences  to  hide  their  deformity,  all  along  by  the  pleasant  water  courses 
to  laugh  when  the  brook  sings,  all  around  houses  and  barns  to  cover 
their  ugliness,  singing  in  the  sunshine,  laughing  in  the  storm,  to  console 
in  the  hour  of  sadness,  to  distill  beauty  on  daily  toil,  to  help  educate 
childhood,  awakening  a  love  for  purity  and  peace,  for  the  beautiful,  the 
noble,  and  the  good. 

"An  ideal  school  is  a  home,  not  indeed  for  supplying  meats  and  drinks 
for  the  bodies  that  perish,  but  a  spirit  home,  where  hungering  and  thirst- 
ing souls  are  satisfied,  where  dormant  energies  are  aroused,  stimulated, 
inspired  to  noble  action,  where  spiritual  growth,  strength,  harmony, 
beauty,  are  the  results.  An  ideal  school,  like  home,  is  one  shut  out  from 
the  bustle  and  strife  of  life,  amid  rural  quietudes,  where  all  its  surround- 
ings are  pure,  simple,  temperate,  gentle,  congenial,  honest,  industrious, 
intelligent,  religious,— a  community  wherein  joyous  childhood,  ardent 
youth,  earnest  manhood,  silver-locked  age,  all  are  inspired  by  common 
purpose,  upheld  by  honest,  rugged  toil,  lit  up  by  sincere  affection,  its 
quiet  hours  filled  with  gladsome  pursuits.  In  future  years,  scenes  and 
words  and  deeds,  like  some  old  trail  through  the  wood  overgrown  with 
bush  and  wild  flowers,  are  revealed  in  their  dim  outlines,  bringing  back 
the  early  lessons  of  the  heart,  when  apt  and  noble  teachers,  though  hum- 
ble, instructed  in  lessons  rude  it  may  be  yet  the  very  reminders  of  which 
are  sacred  relics.  To  memory  every  such  year  appears  as  a  continuous 
summer  without  a  gloom,  every  night  a  moonlit  and  star-eyed  one,  every 
cloud  rainbow-wreathed.  The  innocence  of  childhood  bursting  into  the 
enthusiasm  of  youth,  is  susceptible,  impressible,  palpitating  with  gladness. 


;94 


LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 


breathing  joy  as  the  rose  breathes  sweetness,  jubilant  as  are  the  birds  in 
a  morning  of  spring,  thrilled  with  delight  by  a  token  of  affection,  enrap- 
tured by  every  revelation  of  beauty,  ready  to  be  nurtured  under  the 
watchcare  of  gentleness  and  piety.  To  such  education  does  not  consist 
in  what  is  learned  from  books.  Fields,  woods,  streams,  light,  darkness, 
storm  and  sunshine,  sky  and  clouds,  all  voices,  are  lessons  joyfully 
received,  all  instructing  to  the  eager  soul.  The  same  is  true  of  life  scenes, 
association,  and  influences.  The  lifeful  laugh,  kind  words  welling  up 
from  the  soul,  story  of  hero,  saint,  or  sage,  all  heart  experiences  enwrapped 
with  sentiment,  all  dreams  of  the  future,  all  worth,  are  teachers,  cherished, 
loved  by  the  young,  touching  as  they  do  the  inmost  chords  of  the  soul. 
All  life  becomes  a  school,  thickly  crowded  with  teachers,  pointing  the 
way  or  speaking  to  the  listening  ear  of  the  earnest  learners,  to  whom  the 
culture  of  each  to-day  is  to  so  live  that  each  to-morrow  shall  be  a  truer, 
nobler,  more  perfect  life. 

"Aspiration  ever  looks  to  the  beckoning  of  a  higher  life,  with  over- 
flowing eye,  flushed  cheek,  quivering  lip;  and  in  older  years  as  we  climb 
the  hills  of  life  and  look  out  from  the  summit  of  the  last  experience,  other 
hills  of  aspiration  are  seen,  their  heads  hid  in  the  blue  of  the  distant  and 
the  unknown.  Still  dreaming  of  the  beyond  and  the  untried,  we  long  to 
go  out  with  the  clouds  that  float  in  the  horizon,  to  these  and  grander 
experiences.  As  we  climb  the  heights  of  a  truer,  nobler  life,  diviner 
prospects  unfold  before  the  ever-enlarging  vision,  and  willing  footsteps 
lead  on  to  the  unattained.  Not  what  we  are,  but  what  we  are  going  to 
be — the  splendid  possibilities— is  what  leads  on.  The  mind's  lawful 
inheritance  is  constant  development  toward  perfection,  and  how  nobly 
beautiful  is  that  youth  who,  compelled  by  the  soul's  longing  for  culture, 
consecrates  himself,  with  all  life  and  power,  to  knowledge,  virtue,  perfec- 
tion, resolving  earnestly  to  attain  his  high  ideal !  The  purpose  to  become 
educated  nerves  to  patient,  persistent  endeavor,  lifts  to  a  higher  plane  of 
living.  The  chiefest  desire  of  the  soul  is  to  get  knowledge,  to  do  good, 
to  love  and  glorify  God.  Youth  needs  a  culture  that  awakens  noble 
emotions,  nerves  the  will  to  high  purposes,  and  thrills  the  inmost  spirit 
with  religious  aspirations,  causing  it  to  shake  its  dusty  robes  and  live  an 
earnest,  self-denying,  devout  life.  In  order  to  do  this  there  must  be  a 
hungering  and  thirsting  after  knowledge,  enabling  one  to  conquer  suc- 
cess. The  young  need  a  culture  that  shall  likewise  awaken  that  enthu- 
siasm and  inspiration  that  will  break  away  from  the  spider  webs  of  rou- 
tine and  the  hoUowness  of  formality,  and  go  with  unfaltering  assurance 
and  unselfish  consecration  to  the  work  of  life. 


SERMONS.  395 

"  Culture  transmuted  into  life  is  the  mainspring,  the  acting  force,  the 
controlling  influence  in  custom,  law,  society,  government.  Lives  strug- 
gling upon  small  beginnings  to  high  stations  and  commanding  influences, 
or  living  nobly  and  grandly  in  obscure  life,  greatly  good  in  an  humble 
work,  become  spiritual  lights  shining  down  through  the  world's  vistas  as 
ever-burning  lamps  to  guide  human  feet.  Humanity  needs  the  inspira- 
tion of  lives  that  attract  to  virtue  and  goodness,  to  pure  and  noble 
experiences — not  lives  that  tell  only  or  mostly  of  outward  circumstances, 
accidental  distinctions,  the  pomp  and  splendor  of  office  and  station,  the 
outward  finish  and  polish  of  fashion  and  show — these  are  not  the  lives 
demanded  by  humanity,  but  rather  lives  that  unfold  the  inner  workings 
of  minds,  the  processes  of  thought,  the  influences  of  emotions  and  sen- 
timents, the  force  of  holy  and  lofty  aims.  Such  lives  transmit  to  us  of 
their  own  powers,  enkindling  in  our  own  natures  aspirations  after  like 
excellencies.  They  awaken  impulses  to  pattern  after  their  virtues,  their 
nobleness  and  devotion  to  truth  and  goodness,  softening,  expanding  the 
heart  with  benevolence,  starting  desires  for  progress,  touching  chords 
that  vibrate  to  the  harmonies  of  universal  brotherhood. 

"All  education  of  the  young  should  strive  to  awaken  aspirations  for 
living  lives  devoted  to  seeking  truth.  The  influence  of  such  a  life  upon 
other  natures  is 

'  Like  that  wild  harp  whose  magic  tone 
Is  wakened  by  the  wind  alone.' 

"They  thrill  responsive  to  its  slightest  touch.  It  is  only  when  the 
soul  speaks  to  soul,  eye  to  eye,  smile  to  smile,  tear  to  tear,  that  this 
power  comes  in  its  fullness." 

We  have  thus  far  repeated  a  few  paragraphs  from  our  departed  Pres- 
ident Allen,  relati\-e  to  the  transcendent  value  of  education  in  general. 
We  will  hear  him  speak  of  the  church  as  a  world  educator: — 

"The  church  is  the  great  supernatural  and  spiritually  organized  life- 
power  of  humanity,  the  embodiment  of  the  religious  life  of  humanity. 
Its  principles  permeate  all  relations  and  conditions  of  life.  It  is  the  mis- 
sion of  the  church,  with  the  Bible  for  her  charter  and  light,  to  infuse  and 
develop  the  religion  of  Christ  in  the  world — to  awaken  and  develop  the 
religious  principle,  in  all  philosophies,  all  arts,  all  sciences,  all  politics,  all 
activities, — to  give  thus  a  Christian  civilization  to  the  world. 

"The  worth  of  the  spirit  is  incomparably  greater  than  treasures  of  the 
world.  Spiritual  beauty  outrivals  all  the  beauty  of  landscape,  of  morning 
and  evening,  of  changing  seasons  and  star-eyed  night.  The  grandeur  of 
soul  surpasses  the  grandeur  of  mountain  and  cataract  and  ocean.     The 


396  LIFE    OF    TRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

sublimity  of  divine  revealings  of  spiritual  truths  transcends  the  teachings 
of  rock  or  star.  All  of  this  worth  and  beauty  and  grandeur  and  sub- 
limity cluster  around  the  church. 

"Viewed  in  this  light,  religious  education  is  important,  essential,  the 
business  of  life.  The  religious  is  the  most  central,  the  highest  principle 
of  our  being.  It  gives  nobility  and  power  to  all  of  the  other  faculties. 
It  must  guide  and  control  and  inspire  all  perfect  education.  Thus  the 
relation  existing  between  religion  and  learning  is  most  intimate  and 
important.  Religious  sentiment  unenlightened  is  blind,  superstitious, 
bigoted;  knowledge,  without  the  religious  element,  is  a  servile  slave, 
working  as  readily  in  the  ranks  of  sin  as  of  holiness.  Education,  without 
being  deeply  religious,  is  education  unto  death;  there  is  no  neutral 
ground.  Life  or  death  will  ever  be  mingled  in  the  fountain  from  which 
our  spirits  drink.  The  great  central  light  in  this  culture  is  the  Bible. 
The  religious  basis  is  the  only  true  foundation  on  which  to  build  institu- 
tions of  learning,  and  their  chief  corner-stone  is  the  Bible.  It  is  the  duty 
of  the  church  to  rear  systems  and  institutions  of  learning  on  such  a  basis. 
Man  soon  outgrows  the  systems  which  he  has  constructed  for  himself. 
He  is  ever  longing  for  something  beyond  his  present  grasp.  Worldly 
possessions  turn  to  bitterness,  and  the  spirit  looks  away  to  the  infinite 
and  eternal  for  satisfaction. 

"The  religion  of  the  Bible  comes  forward  to  renovate  the  world.  It 
commences  with  the  individual,  growing  from  the  heart  outward.  It 
works  humbly  and  carefully  with  the  feeble  in  intellect,  and  is  found  suf- 
ficient to  tax  the  spirits  of  mightiest  grasp. 

"  Modern  civilization  is  a  development,  an  outgrowth  of  Christianity. 
Christianity  touches  upon  every  field  of  science  and  every  subject  of 
learning.  The  very  idea  of  giving  the  Bible  to  man  to  read  is  the  key 
that  unlocks  all  knowledge  and  produces  schools  and  learning.  The 
school  becomes  thus  at  once  an  offspring  of  the  church  and  one  of  her 
most  efficient  agents  in  the  civilization  of  man.  Each  reformatory  move- 
ment is  a  great  smelting  furnace,  purifying  truth  from  dross,  after  which 
it  is  inwrought  into  the  great  systems  of  practical  truth.  Truth  is  pure, 
bright,  penetrating.     It  purifies,  enlightens,  elevates.     It  gi\es  progress. 

"The  divine  life -power  of  the  gospel  has  given  a  new  and  more  pro- 
gressive spirit  to  the  world.  More  light  seems  to  be  the  spontaneous  cry 
of  millions  just  awakening  to  a  consciousness  of  their  destiny.  There  is 
an  earnestness,  a  universality,  in  the  longing  and  striving  after  a  better 
condition,  never  before  experienced. 

"The  church  comes  a  ])ositive  and  constructive  power.      Christ  went 


SERMONS.  397 

about  doing  good,  healing,  strengthening,  persuading,  building  up,  estab- 
lishing righteousness,  and  organizing  a  kingdom  not  of  this  world.  The 
heralds  of  the  cross  have  ever  gone  forth  with  the  implements  of  build- 
ing; they  have  made  encroachments  upon  the  citadel  of  darkness,  leveling 
to  the  ground  many  of  its  strongest  towers,  but  only  as  they  were  pre- 
pared to  usher  in  the  kingdom  of  light. 

"  Man  is  wandering  amid  doubts  and  darkness.  The  waves  of  eternity 
are  ever  washing  the  sands  of  time  from  under  his  feet.  He  wants  some- 
thing real,  something  positive,  to  which  he  can  cling  with  the  assurance 
of  support  and  safety.  This  is  found  in  its  richness  and  fullness  in  the 
religion  of  Jesus.  There  are  greater  conquests  yet  to  be  made  in  the 
domain  of  thought  than  were  ever  made  by  Alexander  or  Napoleon  in 
the  domain  of  empire.  In  gaining  these  conquests  and  preserving  their 
supremacy  the  times  future  are  to  achieve  more  than  the  times  past,  how- 
ever brilliant  those  achievements.  Education  will  have  more  efficient 
agents,  more  ample  means  for  diffusing  her  blessings.  Reform  will  battle 
more  effectually  the  massive  and  adamantine  forms  of  error. 

"The  church  with  her  schools  will  have  to  stand  in  the  high  places  of 
the  earth  as  well  as  in  the  low.     It  must  teach  not  only  by  '  Greenland's 
icy  mountains'  and  'India's  coral  strands,'  but   also  on   Mars'   Hill,  in 
academic  groves,  and  college  halls.     Chairs  of  learning  must  be  conse- 
crated to  her  service;  the  pen  of  the  writer,  the  eloquence  of  the  speaker, 
must  be  baptized  from  on  high.    The  farmer,  the  merchant,  the  mechanic, 
the  day  laborer,  need  a  Christianized  education  that   they  may  reason 
understandingly  of  temperance,  righteousness,  liberty,  and  a  judgment  to 
come.     Above  all,  and  as  a  crown  and  glory  to  all,  deep  and  ardent  piety, 
a  rich  religious  culture,  is  needed.    The  young  and  buoyant  need  religion 
to  lift  above  all  low  impulses,  and  fire  with  lofty  aims,  to  kindle  a  burning 
zeal  for  the  good  of  humanity,  to  impart  a  moral  courage  that  cannot  be 
frowned  down,  a  spirit  not  content  to  move  in  the  smooth,  gentle  current 
of  public  favor,  but  an  aggressive  spirit,  that  will  leap  the  bounds  of  pub- 
lic opinion  and  take  a  bold  stand  for  truth  and  right,  and  maintain  that 
stand  fearless  of  consequences— not  only  maintain  but  build  up,  advance, 
all  noble  interests  and  institutions.     Such  are  the  laborers  needed,  and 
such  their  training." 

Again,  speaking  of  the  importance  of  education  for  the  ministry, 
President  Allen  says: — 

"The  ministry,  with  its  high  privileges  and  large  duties,  needs  to  rise 
above  all  mere  specialties,  all  mere  party  or  sect  training,  and,  linking 
itself  with  all  events  and  peoples,  full  of  all  human  sympathies  and  divine 


398  LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 

sentiments,  thus  to  flash  new  thoughts  and  truths  along  the  pathway  of 
humanity,  awakening  nobler  sentiments,  and  inspiring  to  higher  and  holier 
action.  It  should  be  felt  as  a  positive  and  controlling  power  in  the  world's 
progress  and  destiny.  It  should  rather  guide  than  be  guided,  lead  than 
be  led,  in  all  great  progressive  and  beneficent  movements.  It  should 
show  that  it  feels  the  pulsations  of  the  great  heart  of  humanity.  In 
short,  it  must  be  the  friend  and  support  of  religion,  as  it  unfolds  in  litera- 
ture, science,  art,  education,  industry,  law,  politics,  government,  as  they 
reach  down  in  their  influence  to  the  humblest  member  of  the  great  human 
brotherhood. 

"As  a  people  it  is  especially  our  mission  to  do  all  within  our  power  to 
prepare  such  men,  such  teachers.  Herein  is  a  great  and  exalted  work- 
We  of  to-day  sometimes  think  if  it  were  only  ours  to  have  lived  in  those 
times  when  property  and  life  were  the  forfeitures  for  discipleship  of  Jesus, 
we  too  would  have  joyfully  given  the  spoiling  of  our  goods,  the  offering 
of  our  lives;  but  how  do  we  comport  ourselves  when  called  upon  to  sac- 
rifice— not  to  violence  and  wrong,  but  for  the  sake  of  a  positive  good,  for 
the  upbuilding  of  truth  and  religion?  Blessed  that  age  or  people  which 
has  given  it  some  great  truth  to  establish,  some  great  question  to  solve. 
Such  a  work  develops  very  rapidly  the  latent  powers  of  the  workers. 
Piety,  knowledge,  wealth,  have  scope  for  their  most  industrious  applica- 
tion here — no  place  for  lights  under  a  bushel,  for  talents  buried  in  the 
earth.  A  people  working  under  the  inspiration  of  such  a  mission  are  an 
irresistible  power  for  good.  Let  us  then  give  ourselves  to  the  culture  of 
spiritual  nobility — deep,  earnest  piety,  truth-loving,  self-sacrificing  sin- 
cerity, a  world-subduing  faith.  One  of  the  noblest  uses  of  wealth  is  the 
transmuting  it  into  spiritual  growth.  All  needing  heirs  to  inherit  worthily 
their  property  can  adopt  the  children  of  the  denomination,  and  provide 
for  their  spiritual  growth  through  all  coming  ages.  No  monument  to  the 
memory  of  son  or  daughter  could  equal  such  a  monument.  Those  who 
have  power  through  wealth —  for  wealth  when  rightly  applied  is  power 
— can  exert  untold  power  here,  can  open  to  the  needy  perennial  fountains 
of  good.  Permit  us,  then,  in  conclusion,  to  appeal  to  all  such  to  give 
freely,  nobly,  to  this  great  work." 


I^IST^     OF" 


SUBJECTS  2r  PAPERS  WRITTEN  ^1  PRESIDENT  ALLEN 

PUBLISHED    IN     "SABBATH     RECORDER," 


The  Awakening July  27,  1.S54 

Washington August  10,  1S54 

Mount  Vernon September  14,  1854 

Educational November  16,  1854 

Autumn November  23,  1854 

Progress  in  General December  14,  1854 

The  Training  for  the  Times December  28,  1854 

The  Church;  Her  Relations  and  Responsibilities January  11.  1855 

Receiving  Christ February  i.  1855 

The  Church  and  the  School February  15,  1855 

The  Church  and  the  School.  Historic March  i,  1855 

The  Church  and  the  School,  Historic March,  1855 

The  Church  and  the  School March,  1855 

European  Colleges  and  Universities March  29,  1855 

American  Colleges April  26,  1855 

Humanity May  24,  1855 

Education — Disciplinary August  2,  1855 

College  Location August  23,  1855 

Truth  and  Error December  13,  1855 

Education — Physical January  3,  1856 

The  Scholar  and  Society January  31,  1856 

The  Scholar  and  Society February  21,  1856 

Education — Denominational March  20,  1856 

Spiritual  Dignity April  17,  1856 

Are  We  Able? May  8,  1856 

Laborers  Needed May  22,  1856 

Church  and  School June  5,  1856 

Education — Religious June  12,  1856 

Girard  College  for  Orphans July  17,  1856 

Muzzle  Not  the  Ox September  11,  1856 

Annual  Meeting  New  York  State  Agricultural  Society February  26.  1S57 

Culture  of  Spiritual  Greatness March  5,  1S57 

:'(.  (  401   I 


402  '  LIFE    OF    PRESIDKNT    ALLEN. 

Our  Charitable  Institutions   March  17,  1857 

Alfred  University April  12,  1857 

The  Tribune  vs.  Colleges May  7,  1857 

Reply  to  S.  S.  G.  and  Verdant January  26,  i860 

Spirit  Not  Matter March  i.  i860 

Matter  and  Materialism April  5,  i860 

Materialism— Historic  April  12,  i860 

Sadduceeism April  26,  i860 

Class  Immortality May  10,  i860 

The  Life-Power  of  the  Gospel  August  16.  1S60 

God  as  Creator April  25,  1861 

Nature  of  Creation May  9,  1861 

Prescience  and  Predestination May  30,  1861 

Notes  by  the  Way— Washington  and  Bull  Rim August  29,  1861 

Humanity February  6,  1861 

The  President's  Levee July  3.  1S62 

Civilization July  i7,  1862 

Republican  Liberty July  24,  1862 

Experiences September  3.  1863 

The  Church,  Its  Nature  and  Mission  January  7,  1864 

The  Church,  Its  Nature  and  Mission January  14,  1864 

The  Church,  Its  Nature  and  Mission January  21,  1864 

The  Church,  Its  Nature  and  Mission January  28,  1864 

The  Church,  Its  Nature  and  Mission February  4,  1864 

Theological  Culture February  2,  1865 

Theological  Culture February  9,  1865 

Spiritualism  and  Materialism February  9,  1S65 

Death  of  President  Kenyon May  18,  1S65 

Communion  July  27,  1865 

Communion August  3.  1S65 

Educational  Society's  Report October  19.  1865 

Subjects  of  papers  published  in  Alfred  Student : — 

The  Noachian  Deluge February,  1874 

The  Noachian  Deluge March,  1874 

The  Noachian  Deluge April,  1874 

State  Supervision  of  Schools May,  1874 

Caroline  B.  Maxson  Stillman June,  1874 

Advise  to  Literary  Aspirants June,  1874 

Forcythe  Wilson July,  1874 

Theological  Department July,  1874 

Learning  and  Religion October,  1874 

Effective  Culture October,  1874 

State  Aid  to  Institutions November,  1874 

Culture  and  Civilization November,  1874 

College  Secret  Societies December,  1874 

Death  of  Hon.  Gerrit  Smith January,  1875 

Life's  Mission January,  1875 

Colleges,  Few  or  Many February,  1S75 

Callings— Preparation March,  1875 


PAPERS    WRITTEN    15V    PRESIDENT    ALLI'-N 


403 


Life's  Experiences. 


National  Prosperity. 
Melissa  B.  Kenyon.. 


The  Franklin  Lyceum  

Power 

Ornamentation 

Divine  Providence  in  Human  Progress. 


.January, 
.January, 


Civilization. 

Our  Smaller  Colleges. 


1875 
1875 
1875 
1S76 
1876 


[S76 
1876 
1876 
1876 
1876 


1876 
1876 
1876 
1877 
1877 
1877 


May,  1875 

,     .     .  .  May,  1875 

Cypriote  Antiquities _  >    ^^^^ 

Fragments October    187^ 

TheAi„,ofSUKlen.Ufe ZZZ^S^.Z 

Kenyon  Memorial  Hall 

-'  ,  ^      ,  November, 

Parent  and  Teacher December, 

Truth  Seeking •  December, 

Fiat  Lux „  , 

.       r     ITT  February. 

Education  for  Women March 

Aims  and  Ideas :;;;::;;:;;;March!  1876 

S^t^"'t>°" ZZrZZ" April, 

May, 

,  ,  ,  .  .  May, 

Successful  Living ^^^ 

June, 

^....''^".....'... July.  1^76 

'"  ' July,  1876 

.,.      j^,       ,  November, 

Mixed  Schools.  December, 

Liberty  and  Publicity December, 

Lives;  Their  Influence 

Elizabeth  Barrett  Browning  

Power,  Place,  Purpose ::::::::::::::'::::::::::: February 

February,  1877 

March,  1877 

Giving  and  Receiving  ^p^.^^  ^^___ 

S"ff^^s^ ;;; Apni,  1877 

Biography ••••• ;• ^         g 

The  Earth  the  Schoolhouse  of  Humanity JJJ^y-  ^  /^ 

Mind  and  Race ;:";;:;;;;:zzzz.z.'.june;  1877 

" July,  1877 

God  in  All,  or  Pantheism ZZZctoS  ^877 

Educating  the  Will ,  „ 

^     *,.       ,T     1    T-.^ii  November,  187/ 

Mrs.  Caroline  Healy  Dall T.„nc>rv    iS7S 

college,  of  .heS.a..^ - ZZZ'^Z^.  Z 

Culture,  General  and  Specific ^^^^^  ^^^^ 

Success...^... "■■■■■;^'l..May'  1878 

Margaret  Fuller 

Homeric  Characters 

Love  One  Another 

The  Study  of  History 

Culture  and  Reform ....  December,  1878 

College  Rowdyism February,  1879 

Manners.....^....^ ^Z.^Z^ May,  1879 

Painting  m  Words 

Report.s  a.s  .secretary  of  Educational  Society,  a.s  published  in  Confer- 
ence Minutes: — 
History  and  Organization— First  Annual  Report ^'  5 


Origin  of  the  Modern  College. 
Pessimism  and  Optimism  


June, 187S 

July,  1878 

...October,  1878 
.November,  1878 


404 


LIFE    OF    PRESIDENT    ALLEN. 


Obtaining  Charter,  and   Appointment  of  Wm.   C.    Kenyon  as   President  of  the 

University— Second  Annual  Report i^57 

In  Memory  of  Mrs.  Ellen  Goodrich  Ford;  Burning  of  South  Hall;    History  of 

Learning  and  Religion— Third  Annual  Report 1858 

Importance  of  a  Theological  Department— Fourth  Annual  Report 1859 

Denominational  Positions— Fifth  Annual  Report i860 

Civilization,  Its  Chief  Institutions  and  Power— Seventh  Annual  Report 1862 

The  Church,  Its  Nature  and  Mission— Eighth  Annual  Report 1863 

Theological  Culture— Ninth  Annual  Report 1864 

Home  and  Parent— Tenth  Annual  Report 1865 

Wealth  Transmuted  into  Life— Eleventh  Annual  Report 1866 

Life  and  Labors  of  President  Wm.  C.  Kenyon— Twelfth  Annual  Report 1867 

Denominational  Education— Fifteenth  Annual  Report 1S70 

Our  Mission,  What  Is  It?— Sixteenth  Annual  Report 1871 


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